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on Public Economics |
| By: | Alejandro C. Garcia-Cintado; Celso Jose Costa Junior (celso.costa@fgv.br); Armando Vaz Sampaio (avsampaio@ufpr.br) |
| Abstract: | The global crisis that erupted in 2007 led many countries to embark on countercyclical fiscal policies as a way to cushion the blow of a depressed aggregate demand. Advocates of discretionary measures emphasize that fiscal policy can indeed stimulate the economy. The main goal of this work is to assess whether the fiscal policies pursued by the Brazilian government in the aftermath of the 2008 crisis succeeded in bringing the economy back on track in a sustainable fashion. To this end, the fiscal multipliers of five different shocks are studied in a small open-economy New Keynesian framework. Our results point to the government spending and public investment as the most effective fiscal tools for combating the crisis. However, the highest fiscal multiplier turned out to be the one associated with excise tax reductions. Interestingly, contrary to the government’s expectations, this policy of lowering taxes on manufactured durable goods (IPI) was found to be neutral at a longer horizon as it was not applied horizontally to all sectors of the economy. Seeking to understand, analyze and compare the effects of expenditure- and revenue-based fiscal policies on the Brazilian economy over the post-crisis period of 2008, a standard DSGE model (with the main frictions of this methodology) has been developed and estimated. The model features public capital stock as an input, thus allowing for the analysis of the effects of shocks to public investment on the marginal productivity of private inputs and on the GDP. The spending-based measures were the most successful in affecting GDP over the whole period studied, primarily because of PAC2, whose actual goal was to bolster aggregate demand. It is worth mentioning that stimulus program led to a positive result only up until 2013. Actually, the systematic reduction of this multiplier that followed from that year onwards contributed to deterioration of the Brazilian economy. However, these tools were not the only ones the government availed itself of to prop up aggregate demand. It also resorted to tax exemptions from durable goods consumption without much success, as already underscored above. The main reason for this policy to have failed is that this fiscal stimulus was only targeted at the durable-goods sector, which caused the consumption of non-durable goods to decrease. This latter effect ended up offsetting the positive impact of this policy on economic activity. As already laid out before, should this tax-exemption policy be applied in an horizontal way to all sectors of the economy, the result would be the most efficient one among all fiscal measures under study. |
| Keywords: | Brazil, General equilibrium modeling, Business cycles |
| Date: | 2016–07–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ekd:009007:9528&r=pbe |
| By: | Douglas, Roger (Roger Douglas Associates); MacCulloch, Robert (University of Auckland) |
| Abstract: | Many nations are seeking to reform their welfare states so that costs to the government can be reduced and the quality of outcomes improved. As a potential way to achieve these aims, there has been a surge of interest in the Singaporean model which features compulsory savings accounts and transparent pricing of health services. It has achieved some of the best health-care outcomes in the world at a cost that is the lowest amongst high income countries. In this paper we show how tax cuts can be designed to help establish compulsory savings accounts so that a publicly funded welfare system can be changed into one that relies more heavily on private funding in a politically feasible way. To our knowledge, showing how both a tax and welfare reform can be jointly designed to enable this transition to occur has not been done before. Our policy reform creates institutions that have features in common with Singaporean ones, especially for health-care. However there are also key differences. We present a new unified approach to the funding of health, retirement and risk-cover (for events like unemployment) through the establishment of a set of compulsory savings accounts. A case study of New Zealand is used as an illustration. The fiscal impact of our proposed reform on the government's current and future budgets is reported, as well as its effect on low, middle and high income individuals. |
| Keywords: | welfare state reform, compulsory savings, taxation |
| JEL: | E21 E6 H20 H55 I1 I38 J65 |
| Date: | 2017–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10632&r=pbe |
| By: | Rubolino, Enrico; Waldenström, Daniel |
| Abstract: | We compile data spanning the period 1900–2014 and up to 30 countries to study long-run patterns in the tax elasticity of top incomes. Our results show that top tax elasticities vary tremendously over time; they were medium-to-low before 1950, virtually zero during the postwar era up to 1980 and have thereafter increased to unprecedented levels. We document a strong income gradient in tax response within the top, underlining the importance to study even small top groups separately. Several mechanisms are investigated. Tax-driven income shifting between wage and capital income is important in the very top. Wars, financial crises, and country-specific effects and trends have bearing on top elasticities whereas standard macroeconomic factors and indicators of “real responses†do not. |
| Keywords: | economic history; Income inequality; taxation |
| JEL: | D31 H21 H24 H26 N40 |
| Date: | 2017–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:11935&r=pbe |
| By: | Ligia Alba Melo-Becerra (IHEID, Banco de la República, Bogotá, Colombia); Javier Ávila Mahecha (Dirección de Impuestos y Aduanas Nacionales, Bogotá, Colombia); Jorge Enrique Ramos-Forero (Banco de la República, Bogotá, Colombia) |
| Abstract: | The paper assesses the role of taxes on investment in Colombian firms. The analysis is carried out at the firm level for the period 2003-2014. During this period, the national government set five different tax reforms, including changes in the statutory tax rates, tax credits and incentives for corporate investment. The effect of corporate taxation on investment is estimated by first determining the impact of taxation on the cost of capital by computing the effective marginal tax rates (EMTRs) at firm level. Then, we estimate the impact of the cost of capital on investment through a panel data regression. Endogeneity is controlled by an instrumental variable approach, simulating post-reform effective marginal tax rates under pre-reform firm characteristics. Results are robust with different control variables, although some significant differences by size and economic sector of the firm are found. |
| Keywords: | Corporate Taxes, Marginal Effective Tax Rate, Investment, Cash Flows |
| JEL: | H32 H25 C23 D22 |
| Date: | 2017–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gii:giihei:heidwp10-2017&r=pbe |
| By: | Rubolino, Enrico; Waldenström, Daniel |
| Abstract: | We study the link between tax progressivity and top income shares. Using variation from large-scale Western tax reforms in the 1980s and 1990s and the novel synthetic control method, we find large and lasting boosting impacts on top income shares from the progressivity reductions. Effects are largest in the very top groups while earners in the bottom half of the top decile were almost unaffected by the reforms. Cuts in top marginal tax rates account for most of this outcome whereas reduced overall progressivity contributed less. Searching for mechanisms, real income responses as measured by growth in aggregate GDP per capita, registered patents and tax revenues were unaffected by the reforms. By contrast, tax avoidance behavior related to the management of capital incomes in the very income top appears to lie behind the observed effects. |
| Keywords: | Income inequality; Tax policy |
| JEL: | H21 H24 H26 |
| Date: | 2017–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:11936&r=pbe |
| By: | Bach, Stefan; Beznoska, Martin; Steiner, Viktor |
| Abstract: | This paper documents methodology underlying the construction of the integrated data base for our study on 'Wer trägt die Steuerlast in Deutschland? - Verteilungswirkungen des deutschen Steuer- und Transfersystems' (Who bears the tax burden in Germany? - Distributional Analyses of the German tax and transfer system). Financial support from the Hans Böckler Stiftung for the project is gratefully acknowledged. The paper greatly benefited from comments by the members of the scientific advisory council of the project. |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:fubsbe:201710&r=pbe |
| By: | Cunha, Alexandre B.; Ornelas, Emanuel |
| Abstract: | We study the desirability of limits on the public debt and of political turnover in an economy where incumbents have an incentive to set public expenditures above the socially optimal level due to rent-seeking motives. Parties alternate in office and cannot commit to future policies, but they can forge a political compromise where each party curbs excessive spending when in office if it expects future governments to do the same. In contrast to the received literature, we find that strict limits on government borrowing can exacerbate political economy distortions by making a political compromise unsustainable. This tends to happen when political turnover is limited. Conversely, a tight limit on the public debt fosters a compromise that yields the efficient outcome if political turnover is vigorous. Our analysis thus suggests that to sustain good economic policies, a society needs to restrict either the extent of political turnover or the ability of governments to issue debt, but not both. |
| Keywords: | debt limits; political turnover; efficient policies; fiscal rules |
| JEL: | E61 E62 H30 H63 |
| Date: | 2017–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:11945&r=pbe |
| By: | Cellini, Roberto; Prezzavento, Luca C |
| Abstract: | This article investigates how the public expenditure structure, and the expenditures in specific fields of the public sector, are affected by the dynamics of interest payment on public debt, in the case of Italy. Italy has the third largest public debt in the world, and interest payments are of considerable size; though not steadily, however, their dynamics has been decreasing over the last two decades. This could have represented an opportunity for restructuring public expenditure. However, our results show that there is no effect of the dynamics of interest payments upon the dynamics of primary public expenditure. The result is based on the analysis of both Granger-causality links and simultaneous relations between interest payments and primary public expenditure. Public expenditure is considered in aggregate terms in current and capital account, and as articulated in a number of specific areas. |
| Keywords: | Public debt; Public expenditure; Interest payment; Debt cost; Italy. |
| JEL: | H50 H61 |
| Date: | 2016–12–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:78066&r=pbe |
| By: | Thomas Obst; Özlem Onaran (University of Greenwich); Maria Nikolaidi |
| Abstract: | This paper develops a multi-country post-Kaleckian demand-led growth model that incorporates the role of the government. One novelty of this paper is to integrate cross-country effects of both changes in income distribution and fiscal policy. The model is used to estimate econometrically the effects of income distribution and fiscal policy on the components of aggregate demand in EU15 countries. The results show that a policy mix that combines the simultaneous implementation of a pro-labour wage policy, an expansionary fiscal policy and a progressive tax policy in all EU countries leads to a significant rise in the EU15 GDP. The impact of wage policies is positive but small; the overall stimulus becomes much stronger with fiscal expansion. This policy mix leads to an improvement in the budget balance in all the EU15 countries, suggesting that expansionary fiscal policy is sustainable when it is combined with wage and progressive tax policy. |
| JEL: | E12 E25 E62 |
| Date: | 2017–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pke:wpaper:pkwp1703&r=pbe |
| By: | Carolina Grottera; Franck Nadaud; Emmanuel Combet; Carine Barbier |
| Abstract: | In order to perform income inequality, poverty and welfare analyses, splitting households in different groups is a mandatory approach. Depending on the research purposes, groups can be classified according to income, race, region, and so on (Bourguignon and Pereira da Silva, 2008; Combet et al, 2010; Mathur and Morris, 2014). Ranking households according to their level of income is a standard approach, but the varying profiles that can be seen along the spectrum of the population must be taken into account. For example, the size of the household and the average age of its members generally change in accordance to income. In this sense, modeling choices in economic analyses may lead to very different results, and hence to distinct policy implications. This kind of analysis often considers per capita expenditures or per capita income as indicators. Nonetheless, such approach fails at taking into account potential economies of scale that may arise from cohabitation. Households' needs grow with each additional member, but generally not in a proportional way: people living in the same household may share, to a certain extent, appliances (washing machine, television set, refrigerator, etc.), furniture, as well as room lighting and heating or cooling. Equivalence scales adjust the incomes of households in a way that recognizes differences in the needs of individuals and the economies that flow from sharing resources. The variables that are usually taken into account are the size of the household and the age of its members (OECD, 2013). In this paper, we will compare the profiles of household expenditure by living standard deciles (that is, using equivalence scales ) and per capita income deciles for Brazil and France. The datasets use microdata from national household budget surveys, namely the 2008-2009 POF for Brazil and the 2006 BdF for France. These profiles will be thoroughly analyzed for each of these two countries and then compared. We will also assess the indices of concentration of income and of the various categories of consumption using the two approaches. We will discuss the potential modeling and policy implications of using the two approaches in poverty and income distribution analyses, especially while performing carbon-pricing simulations. Carbon taxes are generally related to energy consumption profiles, which vary according to the household income and possibility of scale gains. Thus, modeling choices may bring about different levels of progressivity, that is, the extent to which the burden of the tax falls in the richer and poorer strata of the population. |
| Keywords: | Brazil and France, Energy and environmental policy, General equilibrium modeling |
| Date: | 2016–07–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ekd:009007:9521&r=pbe |
| By: | George Verikios; Jodie Patron; Reza Gharibnavaz |
| Keywords: | computable general equilibrium, differential incidence, goods and services tax, marginal excess burden, tax reform, value-added tax |
| JEL: | D61 H21 H20 C68 D58 |
| Date: | 2017–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gri:epaper:economics:201702&r=pbe |
| By: | Stéphane Auray (CREST - Centre de Recherche en Économie et Statistique - INSEE - ENSAE ParisTech - École Nationale de la Statistique et de l'Administration Économique); Aurélien Eyquem (GATE Lyon Saint-Étienne - Groupe d'analyse et de théorie économique - ENS Lyon - École normale supérieure - Lyon - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - UCBL - Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 - UJM - Université Jean Monnet [Saint-Etienne] - Université de Lyon - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique); Xiaofei Ma (GATE Lyon Saint-Étienne - Groupe d'analyse et de théorie économique - ENS Lyon - École normale supérieure - Lyon - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - UCBL - Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 - UJM - Université Jean Monnet [Saint-Etienne] - Université de Lyon - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, UEVE - Université d'Évry-Val-d'Essonne, UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2) |
| Abstract: | We quantify the effects of competitive tax reforms within a two-country monetary union model with endogenous entry and endogenous tradability. As expected, their effects on output , consumption, hours worked and the terms of trade are positive. Extensive margins provide additional transmission mechanisms that turn the response of foreign output from negative to positive and yields larger aggregate welfare gains compared to alternative models. These positive spillovers are due to the positive effect of the reform on variety creation in both countries and change our vision of this type of reform from beggar-thy-neighbor to prosper-thy-neighbor. |
| Keywords: | Competitive tax reforms, endogenous tradability, endogenous varieties, monetary union, taxes, fiscal,devaluations |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-01467205&r=pbe |
| By: | Lorenzo Forni; Andrea Bonfatti |
| Abstract: | The paper provides evidence that fiscal rules can limit the political budget cycle. It focuses on the application of the Italian fiscal rule at the sub-national level over the period 2004-2006 and shows that: 1) municipalities are subject to political budget cycles in capital spending; 2) the Italian subnational fiscal rule introduced in 1999 has been enforced by the central government; 3) municipalities subject to the fiscal rule show more limited political budget cycles than municipalities not subject to the rule. In order to identify the effect, we rely on the fact that the domestic fiscal rule does not apply to municipalities below 5,000 inhabitants. We find that the political budget cycle increases real capital spending by about 35 percent on average in the years prior to municipal elections and that the sub-national fiscal rule reduces these figures by about two thirds. |
| Keywords: | Time series;Fiscal rules;Italy;Europe;Government expenditures;Budgets;Regression analysis;local government finance, regression discontinuity, Cross-Sectional Models, Models with Panel Data, Deficit, State and Local Budget and Expenditures, Intergovernmental Relations |
| Date: | 2017–01–20 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:imf:imfwpa:17/6&r=pbe |
| By: | Bogliacino, Francesco; Rojas Lozano, Daniel |
| Abstract: | In this article, we show the evolution of inequality for the largest economies of the Latin American region in the 21st century, with separate consideration of income and wealth. We analyse the drivers of the changes in inequality and possible underlying causes, including the role of the new wave of leftist governments. |
| Keywords: | inequality,new left,income,wealth,social policy |
| JEL: | D63 H53 N16 N36 P52 |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:57&r=pbe |
| By: | Harashima, Taiji |
| Abstract: | The validity of discretionary fiscal policy in a recession will differ according to the cause and mechanism of recession. In this paper, discretionary fiscal policy in a recession caused by a fundamental shock that changes the steady state downwards is examined. In such a recession, households need to discontinuously increase consumption to a point on the saddle path to maintain Pareto efficiency. However, they will not “jump” consumption in this manner and instead will choose a “Nash equilibrium of a Pareto inefficient path” because they dislike unsmooth and discontinuous consumption and behave strategically. The paper concludes that increasing government consumption until demand meets the present level of production and maintaining this fiscal policy for a long period is the best option. Consequent government debts can be sustainable even if they become extremely large. |
| Keywords: | Discretionary Fiscal policy; Recession; Government consumption; Government debts; Pareto inefficiency; Time preference |
| JEL: | E20 E32 E62 H20 H30 H63 |
| Date: | 2017–04–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:78053&r=pbe |
| By: | Andrew Coleman (Department of Economics, University of Otago, New Zealand) |
| Abstract: | This paper provides an analysis of how the New Zealand tax system may be affecting residential property markets. Like most OECD countries, New Zealand does not tax the imputed rent or capital gains from owner-occupied housing. Unlike most OECD countries, since 1989 New Zealand has taxed income placed in retirement savings funds on an income basis, rather than an expenditure basis. The result is likely to be the most distortionary tax policy towards housing in the OECD. Since 1989, these tax distortions have provided incentives that should have lead to significant increases in house prices and the average size of new dwellings, should have reduced owner-occupier rates, and should have led to a worsening of the overseas net asset position. The tax settings are likely to be regressive, and are not intergenerationally neutral, as they impose significant costs on current and future generations of young New Zealanders (and new migrants). Since it does not appear to be politically palatable to tax capital gains or imputed rent, to reduce the distortionary consequences of the tax system on housing markets New Zealand may wish to reconsider how it taxes retirement savings accounts by adopting the standard OECD approach. |
| Date: | 2017–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:otg:wpaper:1709&r=pbe |
| By: | David B. Cashin |
| Abstract: | This study measures the effect of an increase in Japan's Value Added Tax rate on the timing of household expenditures and consumption, which do not necessarily coincide. The analysis finds that durable and storable expenditures surged in the month prior to the tax rate increase, fell sharply upon implementation, but quickly returned to their previous long-run levels. Non-storable non-durable expenditures increased slightly in the month prior to the tax rate increase, but were otherwise unresponsive. A dynamic structural model of household consumption reveals that the observed expenditure responses were driven by stockpiling behavior, the insensitivity of durable and non-durable consumption to a change in the real interest rate, and strong complementarities between durables and non-durables. The results suggest that salient intertemporal price variation may have a large, though highly transitory impact on household expenditures. |
| Keywords: | Consumption ; Fiscal policy ; Intertemporal substitution ; VAT |
| JEL: | D12 E21 E62 E65 H24 H31 |
| Date: | 2017–03–28 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2017-35&r=pbe |
| By: | Rosalia Greco |
| Abstract: | Why doesn’t rising inequality encourage income redistribution? The standard model posits that the more concentrated are income and wealth, the more the median voter values redistribution. Yet despite the marked increase in U.S. inequality, redistribution has barely changed. I approach this puzzle from a fresh angle by considering the role and nature of polarization for the politics of redistribution. While inequality increases voting elasticity with respect of redistribution, polarization has the opposite effect, thus reducing parties' accountability towards voters. But without further structure, inequality and polarization’s effects on redistribution cannot be determined. I demonstrate that for polarization to discourage redistribution, ideology must be a ``normal good'', i.e. its importance for the voters needs to rise with income. Using data from the American National Election Study and the Census, I verify that this is indeed the case. Armed with this result, I use the model to assess the effects of inequality and polarization on redistribution within no-inequality and no-polarization counterfactuals. Effects of ``income elastic'' ideology can account for the stability of redistribution policy, and shed light on the economic implications of political extremism. - Highlight the role of ``ideological salience'' (= importance that voters place on ideology); develop a model of party competition where voters are heterogenous in: 1. income, 2. ideology, 3. ideological salience to analyze the effect of income inequality and party polarization on redistribution. The results depend on the sign of the correlation between income and ideological salience - Validate the model: use survey data to estimate correlation between income and ideological salience via maximum simulated likelihood - Counterfactual analysis: calibrate the model to decompose effects of inequality and polarization - Model: 1. Inequality and polarization push redistribution in opposite directions 2. Sign of effects depends on which group (richer or poorer voters) cares more about social issues (has higher ideological salience) - Empirical analysis: income and ideological salience are positive correlated. In terms of the model, this implies that inequality increases redistribution, while party polarization decreases it - Counterfactual analysis: 1. Estimates of ideological salience, plus contemporaneous increase in inequality and polarization in 1980-2008, can account for stability of redistribution 2. Larger effect for Republican party |
| Keywords: | United States, Public finance, Tax policy |
| Date: | 2016–07–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ekd:009007:9699&r=pbe |
| By: | Nihal Bayraktar |
| Abstract: | Tax simplification has always been in the agenda of policymakers to increase the efficiency of the tax system and tax compliance burdens for taxpayers. At the same time, less complex tax systems can contribute to higher tax revenues with minimum negative distortions to economies. The link between tax simplification and tax efficiency is especially important for policymakers in the era of high government budget deficits, which require collecting higher tax revenues. In the literature, empirical studies on this link between simpler tax systems and tax efficiency are considerably limited. The aim of this paper is the empirical study of the impact of tax simplification on the efficiency of tax systems in a cross-country setting. Simpler tax laws contribute to more efficient administration with less discretion leading to greater efficiencies in tax collection. Similarly, lower corruption associated with simpler tax systems is also expected to yield higher tax efficiency and revenues. The main statistical tools will be regression analyses in addition to graphical and tabular analyses. In the regression specification, tax efficiency will be a function of tax simplification indicators and control variables. The control variables will be selected from macroeconomic, demographic, or institutional variables which can determine the tax effort of countries. Possible control variables can be trade openness, growth, the size of shadow economy, the quality of governance and institutions, population, and macroeconomic stability. A panel dataset will be used in the paper. Around 100 developed and developing countries from different regions of the world will be included in the study. The dataset will cover the years from 2002 to 2012. Tax efficiency (tax effort) will be introduced using two alternative measures: a traditional regression approach and stochastic frontier analysis. Tax simplification will be measured by Time to Comply and Number of Payments from the Doing Business Indicators Database, and tax corruption will be generated from the Enterprise Surveys Database. We expect that the outcomes of the proposed paper can have useful policy implications. It is expected that tax complexity has important impacts on the efficiency of tax systems of countries, but the empirical evidence on this issue is very limited in the literature. The expected outcomes can place numerical values on the possible impact of tax simplification on effectiveness of tax collection systems. |
| Keywords: | Around 100 developed and developing countries from different regions of the world will be included in the study., Tax policy, Public finance |
| Date: | 2016–07–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ekd:009007:9100&r=pbe |
| By: | Frédéric Gavrel (CREM - Centre de Recherche en Economie et Management - UNICAEN - Université Caen Normandie - UR1 - Université de Rennes 1 - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) |
| Abstract: | In the same vein as Blanchard and Tirole (2008) First Pass, this note shows that, under the condition for equilibrium stability, the partial implementation of layoff taxes invariably increases firms' profits as well as workers' utilities by lowering payroll taxes. It also proves that requiring stability does not raise any equilibrium existence issue per se: since the budget constraint of unemployment compensation induces multiple equilibria, the condition for stability simply permits the selection of one of these equilibria. These insights could favor the introduction of firing taxes, which in practice would probably be a gradual process |
| Keywords: | Layoff taxes,payroll taxes,public policy efficiency |
| Date: | 2017–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-01462917&r=pbe |