Wealthier households obtain higher returns on their investments than poorer ones. How should the tax system account for this return inequality? I study capital taxation in an economy in which return rates endogenously correlate with wealth. The leading example is a financial market, where the...

We study the effect of power sharing over income redistribution among different socio-economic groups in a model of redistributive politics with fairness concern. We prove that a unique pure-strategy equilibrium exists under fairly general conditions; and we show that equilibrium transfers...

The last decade has seen a sharp increase in interest in the possible existence of a Paradox of Redistribution (PoR) whereby narrow targeting of social transfers aimed at increasing their redistributive (poverty) impact has the perverse effect of increasing poverty over the medium term due to...

We re-analyze the major explanations of redistribution including the Meltzer-Richard (MR) model, power resources theory (PRT), the Iversen-Soskice political institutions explanation, Lupu and Ponstusson's wage inequality skew, along with works suggesting other causes, such as immigration. The...

This paper explores common trends in inequality and redistribution across OECD countries from the late 1980s to 2013. Low‐end inequality rises during economic downturns while rising top‐end inequality is associated with economic growth. Most countries retreated from redistribution from the...

In an overlapping generations model with two social classes, rich and poor, parents of the different social classes vote on two issues: redistributive policies for them and education investments for their kids. Public education is the engine for growth through its effect on human capital; but it...

This paper utilizes a simple model of redistributive politics with voter abstention to analyze the impact of nonpartisan 'get-out-the-vote' efforts on policy outcomes. Although such efforts are often promoted on the grounds that they provide the social benefit of increasing participation in the...

We suggest a probabilistic voting model where voters' preferences for alternative public goods display habit formation. Current policies determine habit levels and in turn the future preferences of the voters. This allows the incumbent to act strategically in order to influence the probability...

We provide a comprehensive survey of the recent literature on the link between productive government expenditure and economic growth. Starting with the seminal paper of Robert Barro (1990) we show that an understanding of the core results of the ensuing contributions can be gained from the study...

We apply non-linear error-correction models to the empirical testing of the sustainability of the government's intertemporal budget constraint. Our empirical analysis, based on Italy, shows that the Italian government is meeting its intertemporal budget constraint, in spite of the high levels of...