In a decentralised tax system, the effects of tax policies enacted by one government are not confined to its own jurisdiction. First, if both the regional and the federal levels of government co-occupy the same fields of taxation, tax rate increases by one layer of government will reduce taxes...

Concurrent taxation is a feature of many federal systems. As a result, the tax policy of one level of government affects the tax base of the other. A way to check the empirical relevance of this hypothesis is to test for the existence of interdependencies in the tax setting behaviour of various...

In the absence of an equalization grant system, like we justify occurs in Spain at the local level of government, those governments that bear a decrease in their level of tax capacity will have to adjust their budget either by increasing their level of tax effort, by reducing their level of...

This paper analyses the optimal design of a user charge on filing suit, which aims at maximising social welfare. Thus, this instrument must be useful to internalise the social costs and benefits by the litigants, in such a way that if social costs are lower than social benefits the user charge...

We consider a federation with two layers of government, in which Leviathan policy makers levy an excise tax on a consumption good that generates a negative externality and that is produced in an imperfectly competitive market. When both layers of government are allowed to tax, policy choices are...

We examine the tax assignment problem in a federation with two layers of government sharing an elastic tax base, in which Leviathan policy makers levy an excise tax in an imperfectly competitive market and producers lobby for tax rate cuts. If the lobby of producers is very influential on policy...

We test for the state interdependence of gasoline and cigarette taxation in the US (1975-2006). We estimate a tax reaction function, and find that state interdependence is due solely to yardstick competition, since any interaction disappears completely in the case of states with lame duck...

Besley and Rosen (1998) were the first authors to empirically estimate the presence of vertical tax externalities. They tested it on gasoline and tobacco unitary taxes. However, they did not take into account the difference in cost of living across states: high cost areas pay less in real terms...

As recent studies in different countries show, tax data offer the opportunity to estimate income or wealth shares for the upper income groups. However, several critical points must be considered in order to avoid misleading conclusions: the interpolation technique used, legal amendments, and tax...