Does redistribution increase inequality? Is inequality harmfiil for growth? Both questions have recently been addressed in a number of single-tax models. In this paper, I examine the relationship between policy, growth and inequality when income and wealth can be taxed at different rates. In the...

This paper assesses the impact of government fiscal policies on income inequality in Asia. It discusses the role and effectiveness of redistributive fiscal policies and quantifies the effects of taxation and government expenditure on income distributions. Panel estimation for 150 countries with...

In this study, we document the decline in income inequality and a convergence in consumption patterns in Brazilian states in a new database constructed from micro data from the national households' survey. We adjust the state-Gini coefficients for spatial price differences using information on...

How to explain rising income and wealth inequality? We build an original heterogeneous-agent model with three key features: (i) an explicit link between firm's market power and top income shares, (ii) a granular representation of the tax and transfer system, and (iii) three assets with...

We argue that promoting education may be a means to reduceincome inequality. When workers of different skill levels areimperfect substitutes in production, an increase in the level ofhuman capital in the economy reduces the return to education.Hence, a given compression of after-tax incomes can...

This paper addresses the problem of the normative evaluation of income tax systems and income tax reforms. While most of the existing criteria, framed in the utilitarian tradition, are uniquely based on information about individual incomes, this paper, building upon the opportunity egalitarian...

European countries have the world's most redistributive tax and transfer systems. While they have been well equipped to deal with vertical inequality - that is, fostering redistribution from the rich to the poor - less is known about their performance in dealing with horizontal inequality, that...

An influential paper by Berg et al., 'Redistribution, inequality, and growth: new evidence', uses the SWIID data to examine the impact of inequality and redistribution on growth in both developing and developed countries. It finds that while inequality is harmful for growth, redistribution does...

The paper revisits the debate on trickle-down growth in view of the widely discussed evolution of the earnings and income distribution that followed a massive expansion of higher education. We propose a dynamic general equilibrium model to dynamically evaluate whether economic growth triggered...