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on Accounting and Auditing |
| By: | Popova, Daria |
| Abstract: | The Russian tax-benefit system consists of numerous types of support available to a large circle of beneficiaries; they are regulated by a number of legislative acts that focus on certain types of assistance rather than on vulnerable groups. In addition, the decentralization reform of social protection carried out in 2005 motivated many regional governments to implement their own social programs that differ in terms of design and generosity. So far, however, little is known about the impact of the tax-benefit policies on income distribution and poverty in Russia. This paper describes the construction of a tax-benefit microsimulation model for Russia (RUSMOD) which is based upon the EUROMOD platform. RUSMOD simulates the eligibility and receipt of most of the existing monetary policies at the federal and regional levels and assesses their potential redistributive effect. This paper aims to provide necessary background material on the construction of the model to anyone wishing to work with RUSMOD. |
| Date: | 2012–09–25 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ese:emodwp:em7-12&r=acc |
| By: | Casey B. Mulligan |
| Abstract: | This paper calculates monthly time series for the overall safety net’s statutory marginal labor income tax rate as a function of skill and marital status. Marginal tax rates increased significantly for all groups between 2007 and 2009, and dramatically so for unmarried household heads. The relationship between incentive changes and skill varies by marital status. Unemployment insurance and related expansions contribute to the patterns by skill while food stamp expansions contribute to the patterns by marital status. Remarkably, group changes in hours worked per capita line up with the statutory measures of incentive changes. |
| JEL: | E24 H31 I38 J22 |
| Date: | 2012–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:18426&r=acc |
| By: | Samohyl, Robert |
| Abstract: | Governmental agencies, the back office of private firms and nongovernmental organizations experience bureaucratic processes that are often repetitive and out-of-date. These imperfections cause resource misuse and support activities that diminish to the value of the process. An important element of these bureaucratic processes is checking whether certain projects approved by the office have actually been successful in their proposed objectives. Banks and credit card companies must evaluate whether creditors have fulfilled their supposed financial worthiness, tax authorities need to classify sectors of the economy and types of tax payers for probable defaults, and research grants approved by government funding agencies should verify the use of public funds by grant recipients. In this study, logistic regression is used to estimate the probability of conformity of research grants to the financial obligations of the researcher analyzing the correlation between certain characteristics of the grant and the grant´s final status as approved or not. The logistic equation uncovers those characteristics that are most important in judging status, and supports the analysis of results as false positives and false negatives. A ROC curve is constructed which reveals not only an optimal cutoff separating conformity from nonconformity, but also discloses weak links in the chain of activities that could be easily corrected and consequently public resources preserved. |
| Keywords: | Logistic regression; ROC curve; probability; audits; government; research grants |
| JEL: | C12 M42 C25 |
| Date: | 2012–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:41557&r=acc |
| By: | Valeria Pellegrini (Bank of Italy); Enrico Tosti (Bank of Italy) |
| Abstract: | The analyses of the international investment position and balance of payments statistics suggest that foreign assets held abroad are greatly underestimated, in particular in the sector of portfolio investments. The aim of this work is to test this hypothesis and to estimate the magnitude of under-reported assets. The approach is based on the comparison of mirror statistics on portfolio assets and liabilities, mainly using data coming from the Coordinated Portfolio Investment Survey (CPIS) conducted by the IMF, with the addition of information derived from several international databases. For the years from 2001 to 2010 the global discrepancy is estimated to be equal to 7.3% of world GDP on average. Different criteria have been adopted to attribute the share of the estimated under-reporting, particularly significant in the case of mutual funds issued by Luxembourg and the main off-shore centres, to the main euro area countries. Results vary from 6 to 10 per cent of national GDPs. If these amounts were added to national data, statistical consistency in international statistics would improve. |
| Keywords: | international investment position, portfolio securities, under-reporting |
| JEL: | F32 F21 |
| Date: | 2012–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bdi:opques:qef_131_12&r=acc |
| By: | A. MAUROUX (Insee) |
| Abstract: | A tax credit dedicated to sustainable development was first introduced in France in 2005 in order to encourage households to invest in energy conservation and to install renewable energy equipments. It was a big success: between 2005 and 2008 about one primary residence in sixteen was renovated asking for this green tax credit (Clerc, Marcus, Mauroux 2010). In this article we take advantage of an exogenous increase of the tax credit rate to assess its incentive impact. In 2006 the tax credit rate on energy conservation expenditures was raised from 25% to 40% but only for the subset of homeowners living for less than 3 years in a building completed before 1977. We estimate on exhaustive fiscal data the impact of this marginal increase of the tax credit rate on the declaration rate of eligible households using a matching method combined with triple differences, based on Heckman, Ichimura, Smith and Todd (1998). If the tax credit rate had not been raised, in 2006 one eligible household in fifteen among the declarants living for less than three years in a dwelling completed between 1969 and 1976 would not have used this tax credit, one in eight in 2007 and in 2008. Between 2006 and 2008, the additional public cost due to the tax credit increase is at least 80 million euros for the sub-sample of homeowners living for less than 3 years in a dwelling completed between 1969 and 1976, i.e. an average cost between 6,550 and 10,360 euros per additional retrofitted dwelling. Except if the average CO2 emission reductions per household are greater than 10 tonnes each year over the equipment life span, the public cost of a tonne of CO2 avoided by additional declarant among the eligible living in a building completed between 1969 and 1973 would be higher than 32 ¬, the tutelary value of carbon in 2008. |
| Keywords: | tax credit, sustainable development, public policy evaluation, matching, difference-in-differences estimates |
| JEL: | H31 H23 D12 |
| Date: | 2012 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crs:wpdeee:g2012-11&r=acc |