This paper studies the design of the optimal non linear taxation in an economy where longevity varies across agents, and depends on three factors: longevity genes, health investment and farsightedness. Provided earnings, farsightedness and genes are correlated, governmental intervention can be...

The Atkinson-Stiglitz Theorem shows that with weakly separable preferences, differential commod- ity taxes are not needed if an optimal nonlinear income tax is imposed. Redistributive objectives can be achieved with the income tax alone even if goods differ considerably in their income...

We study the optimal design of a social security system when individuals differ in health status and occupation. Health status is private information but is imperfectly correlated with occupation: individuals in harsh occupations are more likely to be in poor health. We explore the desirability...

One of the greatest success stories in our societies is that people are living longer, life expectancy at birth being now above 80 years. Whereas the lengthening of life opens huge opportunities for individuals if extra years are spent in prosperity and good health, it is however often regarded...

The achievements and limitations of the classical theory of optimal labor-income taxation based on social welfare functions are now well known, although utilitarianism still dominates public economics. We review the recent interest that has arisen for broadening the normative approach and making...

Nous proposons une méthode pour évaluer la capacité des systèmes de taxation du revenu de diminuer la pauvreté, lorsque celle-ci est définie en cohérence avec une notion de niveau de vie issue de l’éthique de la responsabilité. Selon cette éthique, toutes les inégalités ne sont pas...

We consider in this paper overlapping generations economies with pollution resulting from both consumption and production. The competitive equilibrium steady state is compared to the optimal steady state from the social planner's viewpoint. We show that the dynamical inefficiency of competitive...

Although the optimal policy under endogenous fertility has been widely studied, the optimal public intervention under endogenous childbearing age has remained largely unexplored. This paper examines the optimal family policy in a context where the number and the timing of births are chosen by...

It is well known that, in OLG economies with life-cycle saving and exogenous growth, competitive equilibria will in general fail to achieve optimality and may even be dynamically inefficient. This is a consequence of individuals accumulating amounts of physical capital that differ from the level...

We argue that the economic evaluation of health care (cost-benefit analysis) should respect individual preferences and should incorporate distributional consid- erations. Relying on individual preferences does not imply subjective welfarism. We propose a particular non- welfarist approach, based...