The increasing political concern about fiscal competition across European countries induced Italy to implement a wide-ranging reform of capital income and business taxation. We describe the reform, briefly discuss its links with other relevant international experiences and reform proposals, and...

We analyze Auerbach´s (1991) proposal of a retrospective capital gains tax, which is equivalent to an accrual tax on an ex ante basis. Using a continuous-time model with stochastic interest rates and serially correlated asset returns, we prove that such an equivalence still holds. This means...

This article compares an ACE system with a CBIT system in an open economy. Using a real-option approach, we show that, if a firm can decide when to invest, a trade-off is found. According to traditional wisdom, a high-income firm investing in an ACE system faces a heavier tax burden at each...

This article studies the effects of corporate tax asymmetries on irreversible investment. We discuss an asymmetric tax scheme where the tax base is given by the firm's return,net of an imputation rate. When the firm's return is less than this rate, however, no tax refunds are allowed. Contrary...

The theoretical work on capital income taxation has focused on conditions under which a tax system preserves investment neutrality. The trouble with such a neutrality view is that it is focused on one margin among others. The economics of start-up firms is, however, fundamentally different from...

The well-known Johansson-Samuelson theorem proves that, in partial equilibrium, comprehensive income taxation with a uniform tax rate does not affect asset values if tax depreciation allowances coincide with economic depreciation. In this article, we show that this result fails to hold in...

We discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the fiscal consolidation package adopted by Italy in 2011. Estimated at 3.3% of GDP, the tax measures were introduced to reduce public deficits without weakening the prospects of economic recovery or producing adverse redistributive outcomes. The tax...