This paper investigates the efficiency argument for a vertical fiscal gap in a federation using a simple model of a central government and several identical states. Each level provides a public good to residents within its jurisdiction and finances it by taxing labour income and rents. If labour...

Evasion and time inconsistency have been prominent concerns in recent discussions capital income taxation, both theoretical and applied. This paper establishes a link between them, suggesting a potentially useful role for evasion additional to those previously identified: by committing to...

This paper, prepared for the Handbook of Income Distribution (edited by A.B. Atkinson and F. Bourguignon), reviews some of the central issues that arise in thinking about the motives for, politics of, constraints on and measurement of, redistribution. Amongst the themes are: the potential...

The importance and complexity of petroleum and hard minerals operations is matched by the importance and complexity of finding effective ways to tax them. Many of these challenges arise in other activities too (exhaustibility of deposits being the main exception), but they take such extreme form...

We study the efficiency of credit market equilibria when financial intermediaries cannot observe the riskiness or the returns of potential investment projects. With loan financing, there is over-investment in high-return, high-risk projects and under-investment in low-return, low-risk projects...

Using the self-selection approach to tax analysis, this paper derives a modified Samuelson Rule for the provision of public goods when the government deploys an optimal non-linear income tax. This approach gives a straightforward interpretation of the central result in this area, generalizes it...

A classic argument in the theory of crime is that optimal enforcement policy should involve maximal sanctions combined with minimal detection costs. Yet this is rarely observed in the real world. We argue that reson for this has to do with the time inconsistency of such a policy. If sanctions...

This paper surveys the evolution of the use of the theory of second best in public economics. It argues that much of modern normative public economics can be interpreted as simply applied second-best analysis. The original theory of second best as expounded by Lipsey and Lancaster involved...

Governments typically used expenditures extensively as redistributive devices. Examples include the public provision of health, education, welfare, and public pensions. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the normative rationale for such policies. In particular, we study the role of...

This paper compares ad valorem and specific taxation in two models of oligopoly, with and without free entry. Predominantly ad valorem taxation implies a relative low consumer price, high tax revenue and (when entry is precluded) low profits. Ad valorem taxation dominates specific from the...