Proponents of a basic income (BI) claim that it could bring significant reductions in financial poverty, on top of many other benefits, including greatly reduced administrative complexity and cost. Using microsimulation analysis in a comparative two-country setting, we show that the potential...

Proponents of a basic income (BI) claim that it could bring significant reductions in financial poverty, on top of many other benefits, including greatly reduced administrative complexity and cost. Using microsimulation analysis in a comparative two-country setting, we show that the potential...

Proponents of a basic income (BI) claim that it could bring significant reductions in financial poverty, on top of many other benefits, including greatly reduced administrative complexity and cost. Using microsimulation analysis in a comparative two-country setting, we show that the potential...

The systems of direct taxes and cash benefits in the Member States of the European Union vary considerably in size and structure. We explore their direct impacts on cross-sectional income inequality (termed redistributive effect for the purpose of this paper) using EUROMOD, a tax-benefit...

Over the last few years concern for income inequality in European countries has increased remarkably. In this context, taxation is an important redistributive instrument and we investigate the redistributive role of direct taxes. We focus on the EU-15 countries and the evolution over the period...

Expanding childcare is often considered as a suitable way to enhance employment opportunities of mothers with young children as well as to reduce child poverty. In this study the authors critically investigate this assertion by simulating a set of scenarios of increasing subsidized childcare...

Western countries' income tax systems exempt the return from investing in owner-occupied housing. Returns from other investments are instead taxed, thus distorting households' portfolio choices, although it is argued that housing property taxation might act as a counterbalance. Based on data...

Many researchers and policymakers have made strong arguments for broadening the taxes on wealth and its returns. Although the theoretical literature on (optimal) wealth taxation is growing, there exists a large void in empirical research. This paper addresses this void by analysing the...

Imputed rental income of homeowners is tax exempt in most countries, despite the long-standing arguments recommending its inclusion in the tax base, on both equity and efficiency grounds. The current fiscal crisis revived interest towards this form of taxation. The paper investigates the fiscal...

To what extent can a country's effectiveness in reducing child poverty be attributed to the size of family cash transfers (i.e. both benefits and tax advantages) or to their design? In this paper, we disentangle the importance of each of these two factors, focusing on the family support system...