Federal Collection of State Individual Income Taxes

Abstract

The federal government and many state governments collect individual income taxes. In this paper, I ask whether the federal government should offer to collect individual income taxes for the states and then distribute the collected taxes. I begin by making advances to the theory of joint collection and use these advances to establish a framework to analyze joint collection. I then consider the United States’ failed attempt to create a program for joint collection in 1972 and compare today’s conditions to those of 1972. I conclude by highlighting the features a new joint collection program would need to avoid the shortcomings of the 1972 attempt.