In early 2008 the federal government instructed the Productivity Commission (PC) to enquire into the social and economic policy issue of paid parental leave (PPL). In their draft report, the PC (2008) has called for a taxpayer funded scheme of 18 weeks duration, despite Australian governments...

We use the first three waves of the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey to examine the retirement plans of middle-aged workers (aged 45-55). Our results indicate that approximately two-thirds of men and more then half of women appear to be making standard retirement...

We show that measurement error in the constructed price of child care can explain why previous Australian studies have found partnered women’s labour supply to be unresponsive to child care prices. Through improved data and improved construction of the child care price variable, we find child...

The purpose of this paper is to improve our understanding of the relationship between child care price and women's labour supply. We specify and estimate a discrete, structural model of the joint household decision over women's labour supply and child care demand. Parents care about the...

Given its signiÖcance in practice, piecewise linear taxation has received relatively little attention in the literature. This paper o§ers a simple and transparent analysis of its main characteristics. We fully characterize optimal tax parameters for the cases in which budget sets are convex...

This paper introduces a static structural model of hours of market labor supply, time spent on child care and other domestic work, and bought in child care for married or cohabiting mothers with pre-school age children. The father's behavior is taken as given. The main goal is to analyze the...

This paper presents for the .rst time the properties of optimal piece-wise linear tax systems for two-earner households, based on joint and individual incomes respectively. A key contribution is the analysis of the interaction of second earner wage di¤erences, variation in prices of bought-in...

In the absence of a broad-based pension scheme, the elderly in developing countries may rely on monetary transfers made by their children and on their own labour supply. This paper examines whether monetary transfers from children help to reduce elderly parents’ need to work. Taking the...

The Mirrlees Review of the UK tax system, together with its companion volume of research papers, can be expected to influence future discussions of tax reform. Indeed, this can already be recognised in the Henry Review. As far as income taxation is concerned, the most substantive recommendation...

In the early 1980’s Australia had a highly progressive, individual based income tax and families received support for dependent children in the form of universal family allowances. The introduction of income tests for child support payments based on family income (now in the form of Family Tax...