Tax Law & Policy eJournal最新文献

{"title":"Endowment and Inequality","authors":"Daniel N. Shaviro","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.180577","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.180577","url":null,"abstract":"Neither income, consumption, nor wealth is an \"ideal\" tax base, or one that plausibly identifies what one really should want to tax. Rather, they are best justified as imperfect stand-ins for some underlying (but unobservable) metric of inequality that may be relevant to distributive justice under a variety of normative views.This paper examines a more fundamental inequality measure that we might call \"endowment,\" \"ability,\" or \"wage rate,\" and explores its relevance to distribution policy under welfarist and liberal egalitarian approaches to distributive justice. It argues that, while endowment taxation is not practically feasible, conventional rejections of it as an orienting idea, sometimes explained on the ground that it would require enslaving a beachcomber who could have been a Wall Street lawyer, are in key respects confused.","PeriodicalId":180571,"journal":{"name":"Tax Law & Policy eJournal","volume":"20 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1999-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121394764","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Unemployment Outflow and Unemployment Insurance Taxes","authors":"Š. Jurajda","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.182751","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.182751","url":null,"abstract":"The system of Unemployment Insurance (UI) financing in the US draws its funds from a payroll tax on employers and varies the tax rate according to the individual employer's layoff history. There exists extensive evidence on the effect of this so-called experience rated tax on layoff decisions. However, since firms are liable for each dollar of regular UI benefits paid to laid off former employees, experience rating may also affect recall behavior. The present study therefore measures the effect of the UI financing system on the duration of unemployment. Using duration data is essential since tax charges to the firm vary over the duration of unemployment spells. Empirical results based on data with various sources of variation suggest that higher layoff tax costs shorten the duration of recall unemployment.","PeriodicalId":180571,"journal":{"name":"Tax Law & Policy eJournal","volume":"31 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1999-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"117286738","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Taxation and Saving","authors":"B. Bernheim","doi":"10.3386/W7061","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/W7061","url":null,"abstract":"In this survey, I summarize and evaluate the extant literature concerning taxation and personal saving. I describe the theoretical models that economists have used to depict saving decisions, and I explore the positive and normative implications of these models. The central positive question is whether and to what extent specific public policies raise or lower the rate of saving. The central normative question is whether and to what extent it is desirable to tax the economic returns to saving. I also examine empirical evidence on the saving effects of various tax policies. This evidence includes econometric studies of the generic relation between saving and the after-tax rate of return, as well as analyses of responses to the economic incentives that are imbedded in tax-deferred retirement accounts. Finally, I also discuss several indirect channels through which tax policy may affect household saving by altering the behavior of third parties, such as employers.","PeriodicalId":180571,"journal":{"name":"Tax Law & Policy eJournal","volume":"11 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1999-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114826936","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Effective Marginal Tax Rates on Low-Income Households","authors":"Daniel N. Shaviro","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.162569","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.162569","url":null,"abstract":"Discussion of marginal tax rates (MTRs) on low-income households often ignores the significance of income-conditioned benefits such as TANF, Food Stamps, Medicaid, and housing vouchers, and fails to account properly for the payroll tax or the possible accrual of expected Social Security benefits. This paper discusses the equivalence between a benefit phaseout and an explicit MTR and provides rough ballpark estimates of the MTRs that a one-parent, two-child household might face as its earnings increased from 0 to $25,000. It finds that these MTRs are generally quite high, especially at the range from just below to just past the official poverty line, by reason of the application of multiple phaseouts. In a worst-case scenario, such a household might even be better-off with earnings of $10,000 than of $25,000.","PeriodicalId":180571,"journal":{"name":"Tax Law & Policy eJournal","volume":"51 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1999-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115051827","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"County Fiscal Stress: Cause and Consequence in California after Proposition 13","authors":"Robert W. Wassmer, C. Anders","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.147916","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.147916","url":null,"abstract":"Proposition 13 requires that the state of California divide countywide property tax revenue among local governments. Until the early 1990s, the allocations that existed in the three years prior to the passage of the proposition largely determined these divisions. In the early 1990s the state responded to the dual pressure of a recession and its constitutional obligation to fund K-14 education by shifting a portion of the allocation of property tax revenue away from county governments and toward public schools. Observers claim that the post-Proposition 13 method of property tax disbursement, and the changes to it in the early 1990s, exacted a toll on the fiscal well being of many of California's counties. This study seeks evidence for or against this claim through the regression analysis of a panel of fiscal data from California's stand-alone counties. Due to Proposition 13 like reforms being adopted, or being considered by other states, interest in the results of this study should extend beyond California.","PeriodicalId":180571,"journal":{"name":"Tax Law & Policy eJournal","volume":"22 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129235869","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Can the Graduated Income Tax Survive Optimal Tax Analysis?","authors":"L. Zelenak, K. Moreland","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.163381","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.163381","url":null,"abstract":"Optimal tax analysis attempts to find the income tax rate structure which maximizes social welfare, under a chosen social welfare function (which can range from purely utilitarian to a Rawlsian maximin). It provides sophisticated mathematical techniques for balancing the welfare gains from redistribution against the welfare losses from the disincentive effects of taxation. Although the results of optimal tax simulations are sensitive to factual assumptions (relating to the rate at which the marginal utility of money declines, the strength of the disincentive effects of taxation, and the distribution of wage rates) and to the choice of social welfare function, one result is surprisingly robust: the marginal tax rate rises through the bottom decile of the societal wage distribution, but falls as income increases thereafter. These results provide high-level intellectual support for the attack on progressive marginal rates by the flat tax movement. To date, however, optimal tax simulations have uniformly assumed that much or all of the revenue raised by taxation will be used to finance universal cash grants (\"demogrants\"), and the combined effect of the cash grants and the regressive marginal rate structure has been optimal tax-and-transfer systems with progressivity of average (as contrasted with marginal) tax rates. The paper criticizes the demogrant assumption as politically unrealistic, and considers whether optimal marginal rates would continue to be regressive if demogrants are ruled out on political grounds?i.e., if the only purpose of taxation is to finance non-redistributive governmental functions. The paper reports on the results of a simulation which assumes no demogrants, a poverty-level exemption (zero bracket), and two rate brackets above the exemption. In that case, the second bracket rate should be higher than the first. In other words, without demogrants the optimal two-bracket tax system has progressive marginal rates. Thus the reliance on optimal tax analysis by flat tax proponents is inappropriate, if those proponents do not also support demogrants. The paper also surveys the optimal tax literature for other indications progressive marginal rates may be optimal under non-standard assumptions. In particular, progressive marginal rates may be optimal (even in the context of demogrants) if people care about relative levels of consumption, if there is significant wage uncertainty, or if the distribution of wage rates is different from that usually assumed.","PeriodicalId":180571,"journal":{"name":"Tax Law & Policy eJournal","volume":"171 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132436231","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Earned Income Tax Credit and the Labor Supply of Married Couples","authors":"Nada O. Eissa, H. Hoynes","doi":"10.3386/W6856","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/W6856","url":null,"abstract":"Over 18 million taxpayers are projected to receive the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) in tax year 1997, at a total cost to the federal government of about 25 billion dollars. The EITC is refundable, so that any amount of the credit exceeding the family's tax liability is returned in the form of a cash refund. Advocates of the credit argue that this redistribution occurs with much less distortion to labor supply than that caused by other elements of the welfare system. This popular view that the credit is unlikely to hold among married couples. Theory suggests that primary earners (typically men) would increase labor force participation, but secondary earners would reduce their labor supply in response to an EITC. We study the labor supply response of married couples to several EITC expansions between 1984 and 1996. While our primary interest is the response to changes in the budget set induced by the EITC, our estimation strategy takes account of budget set changes caused by federal tax policy, and by cross-sectional variation in wages, income, and family size. We use both quasi-experimental and reduced form labor supply models to estimate the impact of EITC induced tax changes. The results suggest that EITC expansions between 1984 and 1996 increased married men's labor force participation only slightly but reduced married women's labor force participation by over a full percentage point. Overall, the evidence suggests that family labor supply and pre-tax family earnings fell among married couples. Our results imply that the EITC is effectively subsidizing married mothers to stay at home, and therefore have implications for the design of the program.","PeriodicalId":180571,"journal":{"name":"Tax Law & Policy eJournal","volume":"79 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1998-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123405487","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Optimal Redistributive Capital Taxation in a Neoclassical Growth Model","authors":"Kevin J. Lansing","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.141168","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.141168","url":null,"abstract":"This paper provides a counterexample to the simplest version of the redistribution models considered by Judd (1985) in which the government chooses an optimal distortionary tax on capitalists to finance a lump-sum payment to workers. I show that the steady-state optimal tax on capital income is generally non-zero when the capitalists' utility is logarithmic and the government faces a balanced-budget constraint. With log utility, agents' optimal decisions depend solely on the current rate of return, not any future rates of return or tax rates. This feature of the economy effectively deprives the government of a useful policy instrument because promises about future tax rates can no longer influence current allocations. When combined with a lack of other suitable policy instruments (such as government bonds), the result is an inability to decentralize the allocations that are consistent with a zero limiting capital tax. I show that the standard approach to solving the dynamic optimal tax problem yields the wrong answer in this (knife-edge) case because it fails to properly enforce the constraints associated with the competitive equilibrium. Specifically, the standard approach lets in an additional policy instrument through the back door.","PeriodicalId":180571,"journal":{"name":"Tax Law & Policy eJournal","volume":"94 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1998-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127990347","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Federalizing the Tax-Free Merger: Toward an End to the Anachronistic Reliance on State Corporation Laws","authors":"Steven A. Bank","doi":"10.2139/SSRN.140298","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/SSRN.140298","url":null,"abstract":"This articles examines the requirement that a merger be \"statutory,\" or conducted pursuant to the corporation laws of a state, to be tax-free. The statutory merger requirement for \"A\" reorganizations is an anachronistic remnant of the 1930s belief that state corporation laws are effective regulators of corporate combinations and bulwarks against abuse of the tax-free reorganization provisions. This reliance on state corporate law standards is not only inconsistent with the recently adopted check-the-box regulations and no longer much of a regulator of any kind, but also is counterproductive in that it introduces disparities of treatment between parties based on their location. Ironically, the statutory merger requirement could conceivably prevent de facto mergers and mergers involving single-member limited liability companies, but permit mergers under nouveau corporate law statutes that do not require the parties to \"merge\" under any conventional sense of the word. Form is elevated above substance in a way that is both irrational and unproductive. In light of the failed efforts to remove the A reorganization from the Code altogether, the Article concludes that the statutory merger requirement should be eliminated from the A reorganization so that a more uniform standard can be applied by the courts and the IRS.","PeriodicalId":180571,"journal":{"name":"Tax Law & Policy eJournal","volume":"34 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1998-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121721917","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"A Comprehensive Wealth Tax","authors":"D. Shakow, R. Shuldiner","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.169728","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.169728","url":null,"abstract":"Income, consumption, and wealth are all possible bases for a tax system in the United States. Scholars have specified the structure of income tax and consumption taxes, but no one has attempted to describe in detail a comprehensive wealth tax for the United States. In this paper, we begin to develop such a structure. In particular, we hypothesize that the combination of a flat rate tax on networth and a flat rate tax on earned income along with an appropriate level of exemptions, could be an attractive tax base. In order to explore the structure of a wealth tax, we first specify the base of the tax. Using the Federal Reserve Board?s Survey of Consumer Finances we then estimate the tax rates that would be needed to raise the same revenue as currently raised by the personal and corporate income tax. We find that rates of 1.57% on net worth and 17.7% on earned income would be required. We also explore the rates that would be required under alternative specifications of the base. Once we have specified the base and the rates, using the SCF data we are then able to explore the distribution of the tax by income class. We compare the distribution to the distribution of the current Federal income tax. We find that the wealth tax we describe is able to achieve the same level of progressivity over much of the income range.","PeriodicalId":180571,"journal":{"name":"Tax Law & Policy eJournal","volume":"21 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1998-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"117052139","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}