on transfers and public goods are each integrated into a common optimal tax framework with the income tax and commodity … taxes at the core. Additional topics addressed include a range of dynamic issues, the unit of taxation, tax administration … and enforcement, and tax equity …

-of-variety, infer whether or not product variety is socially optimal (at current tax rates), and implement our desirability condition …

This paper explores the implications of tax rate uncertainty, identifying circumstances in which revenue-neutral tax … heterogeneous taxpayers, tax rate variability is shown to perform an efficiency-enhancing screening function, imposing heavier … expected tax burdens on less responsive taxpayers. And while efficient tax uncertainty enables governments to reduce average …

Executors of estates for decedents in 2010 could choose between an estate tax regime and a basis carry-over regime. For … most executors, this created a tradeoff between a current estate tax payment and a future capital gains tax liability for … assets, outstanding debts, whether the decedent resided in a state with an estate tax, and the basis of assets held at the …

Much criticism of the income tax involves administration: the enormous complexity of the system is responsible for … large compliance costs, public and private, and the tax gap is large despite substantial resources devoted to enforcement … fundamental restructuring of the tax system. But evaluation of such changes is difficult because the underlying problems have not …

This paper addresses the optimal degree of law enforcement regarding tax evasion. It derives the conditions that … characterize the optimal size of a tax collection agency, and then provides a simple interpretation of the conditions in terms of … a policy based on a naive cost-benefit analysis of the tax collection agency could result in a substantial …

effectiveness. This paper investigates whether a low-capacity state can increase its tax revenue by optimally assigning its tax … collectors. We study the two-stage random assignment of property tax collectors into teams and to neighborhoods in a large … with other high-ability collectors. According to our estimates, implementing the optimal assignment would increase tax …

This paper studies the role of technology in local-government tax collection capacity in the developing world. We first … tax billing, collection and enforcement. We then randomize the use of a new revenue collection technology within one large … tax revenues than control collectors. Collectors using the new technology learned faster about which households in their …