This paper develops a model of local income tax competition with a progressive tax scheme and a built-in fiscal equalization scheme. Both aspects are central to policy makers: The progressivity for equity reasons, and the fiscal equalization to prevent a race to the bottom and to limit the...

Income and property taxation are among the most prevalent policy instruments to finance local expenditure in countries with a high degree of decentralization. However, little is known about their relative efficiency and redistributive properties. This paper compares both tax instruments within...

Recent contributions on tax competition recognize the interaction between both horizontal and vertical tax externalities in a single federation. In this paper, we extend the theoretical analysis to a framework with multiple federations (a Union). We show that the relative size of a federation in...

Building on recent contributions to the New Economic Geography literature, this paper analyses the relation between asymmetric market size, trade integration and business income tax differentials across countries. First, relying on Ottaviano and Van Ypersele's (2005) foot-loose capital model of...

This paper investigates efficiency losses caused by independent tax systems and proposes ways of remedying this coordination failure Whereas the harmful effects of tariff competition have been thoroughly explored in the trade policy literature little is known about the externalities that result...

This paper tests the central predictions of the theoretical tax competition literature for capital tax rates for a panel of European Union countries, notably a race to the bottom in corporate tax burdens. In contrast to the previous empirical literature, empirical support for increasing capital...

The paper investigates the effect of asymmetric debt and debt servicing obligations on taxes and primary spending in a standard tax competition model, assuming public debts are pre-determined and in their steady state. The impact of increasing financial market integration and capital mobility on...

This paper proposes a unifying framework for theories of capital tax competition, and surveys and synthesizes the literature within this framework. The synthesis covers various standard tax competition models, models allowing for leviathan governments and democratic elections, in addition more...

This study analyses relative sectoral specialisation of EU regions on the basis of investment and employment patterns. Controlling for heteroscedasticity and potential endogeneity in the econometric analysis, we find that relative specialisation in manufacturing sectors is higher in central...

This paper conducts a spatial econometric analysis of the determinants of regional specialisation patterns. Spatial autocorrelation is present, but is mostly due to spatial error autocorrelation. Spatial interaction due to economic interdependencies is only evident for some few labour-intensive...