By using official time series of the Italian evaded VAT base (Ministry of Finance) for the period 1980-2004 we investigate empirically the long-run characteristics of tax evasion and the relationship with the tax burden. We focus on three important issues not analyzed so far[...]

While there is an extensive literature on tax evasion a further aspect of cheating on the state, namely benefit fraud, has gained relatively modest attention in the economic literature. This paper seeks to fill this gap. We explore differences between benefit fraud and tax evasion due to...

The German Income Tax Reform 2000, which announced a reduction in income tax rates to beimplemented in a series of three stages, was welcomed by the public as a step towards unleashinglurking growth potentials. Nonetheless, in the course of the year 2001 a dispute arose, centeringaround the...

In this paper we use a dynamic structural life-cycle model to analyze the employment,fiscal and welfare effects induced by unemployment insurance. The model features a detailedspecification of the tax and transfer system, including unemployment insurance benefitswhich depend on an individual's...

We use a stylized model to show that, if transfers to the poor arefounded on a security argument, there is a negative trade-off betweenlaw enforcement expenditures and criminality. In contrast, if transfersare based on altruism, the correlation between the same variables mayappear positive. We...

This paper analyses the effects of discretionary fiscal policy by presenting new empiricalevidence for Germany within a structural vector autoregression (SVAR) framework. FollowingBlanchard and Perotti (2002), the SVAR model is identified by applying institutionalinformation. We find no...

The output multiplier turns negative before a deficit spending program expires.We show the generality of this unpleasant finding for the standard real business cyclemodel. We then calibrate an extended model for the US and demonstrate how fiscalstimulus slows down economic recovery from...

This paper uses an overlapping generations model with international labor mobility and apolitically responsive fiscal policy to examine aging in developed and developing regions.Migrant workers change the political structure composed of young and elderly voters in bothlabor-receiving and...

When a deficit occurs in the funding of collective goods, it is usually covered by raising theamount of taxes or by rationing the supply of the goods. This article compares the efficiencyof these institutions. We report the results of a 2x2 experiment based on a game in the firststage of which...