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on Accounting and Auditing |
| By: | Hundsdoerfer, Jochen; Sielaff, Christian; Blaufus, Kay; Kiesewetter, Dirk; Weimann, Joachim |
| Abstract: | We apply conjoint analysis to study the influence of tax labeling and tax earmarking on German taxpayers' willingness to contribute. From a survey based sample we show that labeling and earmarking effects can substantially increase participants' willingness to contribute, which results in a considerable deviation from a pure consumption maximizing behavior. Furthermore, we give an explanation for this effect regarding socio-demographic attributes of German taxpayers. These results explain the variety in tax labels and provide implications for tax policy regarding further reforms of the tax and contribution system: Labeling and earmarking of contributions are important instruments in selling policies and increasing tax revenue. -- |
| Keywords: | Behavioral Taxation,Tax Labeling,Tax Earmarking,Willingness to Contribute,Conjoint Analysis,Perceived Tax Burden |
| JEL: | H20 H51 H52 K34 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:arqudp:121&r=acc |
| By: | Conefrey, Thomas; FitzGerald, John |
| Keywords: | taxes |
| Date: | 2011–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:esr:wpaper:rb2011/2/1&r=acc |
| By: | Maria-Grazia Attinasi (European Central Bank, Kaiserstrasse 29, D-60311 Frankfurt, Germany.); Cristina Checherita-Westphal (European Central Bank, Kaiserstrasse 29, D-60311 Frankfurt, Germany.); Malte Rieth (TU Dortmund University, Applied Economics Vogelpothsweg 87, D-44227 Dortmund, Germany.) |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates empirically the effect of personal income tax progressivity on output volatility in a sample of OECD countries over the period 1982-2009. Our measure of tax progressivity is based on the difference between the marginal and the average income tax rate for the average production worker. We find supportive empirical evidence for the hypothesis that higher personal income tax progressivity leads to lower output volatility. All other factors constant, countries with more progressive personal income tax systems seem to benefit from stronger automatic stabilisers. JEL Classification: E63, E32, H10. |
| Keywords: | Progressivity, personal income taxes, output volatility, automatic stabilisers. |
| Date: | 2011–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ecb:ecbwps:20111380&r=acc |
| By: | Chen, Been-Lon; Chen, Hung-Ju; Wang, Ping |
| Abstract: | In a second-best optimal growth setup with only factor taxes as available instruments, is it optimal to fully replace capital by labor income taxation? The answer is generally positive based on Chamley, Judd, Lucas, and many follow-up studies. In the present paper, we revisit this important tax reform-related issue by developing a human capital-based endogenous growth framework with frictional labor search and matching. We allow each firm to create multiple vacancies and each worker to determine labor market participation endogenously. We consider a benevolent fiscal authority to finance direct transfers to households and unemployment compensation only by factor taxes. We then conduct dynamic tax incidence exercises using a model calibrated to the U.S. economy with a pre-existing 20% flat tax on both the capital and labor income. Our numerical results suggest that, due to a dominant channel via the interactions between the firm's vacancy creation and the worker's market participation, it is optimal to switch partly by a modest margin from capital to labor taxation in a benchmark economy where human capital formation depends on both the physical and human capital stocks. When the human capital accumulation process is independent of physical capital, the optimal tax mix features a slightly larger shift from capital to labor taxation; when we remove the extensive margin of the labor-leisure trade-off, such a shift is much larger. In either case, however, the optimal capital tax rate is far above zero. |
| Keywords: | Tax Incidence; Endogenous Human Capital Accumulation; Labor-Market Search and Matching Frictions |
| JEL: | E62 H22 O40 J20 |
| Date: | 2011–08–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:33209&r=acc |
| By: | Diller, Markus; Vollert, Pia |
| Abstract: | This paper aims to analyze the impact of applying for an advance tax ruling and of examining complex tax issues with the help of an external consultant, on the investor's decision to invest when the environment is uncertain. Using decision theory, we first determine the maximum fee an investor is willing to pay for such a ruling or consultation in order to firm up the investment decision. We expand our analysis by assisting the potential investor in deciding on the maximum fee he is willing to pay for such a service when the fee for an advance tax ruling is set by law. -- |
| Keywords: | Advance Tax Rulings,Decision Theory |
| JEL: | H25 K34 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:arqudp:122&r=acc |
| By: | Adam, Antonis; Kammas, Pantelis; Lagou, Athina |
| Abstract: | Abstract: This paper applies meta- regression analysis to the empirical literature that examines the impact of international market integration on capital taxation. The main objective is to explore whether particular data, model specification and estimation procedures exert systematic impact on the reported findings. Our results provide empirical evidence that differences across studies can be attributed to differences in the measurement of globalization. Moreover, in contrast to the conventional wisdom, study characteristics related to the measurement of the tax burden on capital appear to have an insignificant effect on the above mentioned relationship. Finally the meta- analysis fails to confirm a negative effect of globalization on the taxation of capital. |
| Keywords: | capital mobility; tax competition; Meta analysis |
| JEL: | H4 F2 H2 |
| Date: | 2011–09–14 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:33382&r=acc |
| By: | Pieretti, Patrice; Thisse, Jacques-François; Zanaj, Skerdilajda |
| Abstract: | Our aim is to explain how a small country can be viable as an international banking center (IBC). We build a model in which mobile investors choose between two banking centers located respectively in a small country and in a large country. These countries compete in two instruments, taxation and institutional infrastructure. It follows that an IBC can be a tax haven, a safe haven, or both. A small country that hosts an IBC is a safe haven when it is able to provide a high level of institutional infrastructure, whereas it chooses to be a tax haven when it cannot be competitive in institutional infrastructure. Even in this last case, an IBC need not be as bad as claimed in the general press because its presence fosters institutional competition across countries, which is ultimately beneficial to all investors. |
| Keywords: | institutional infrastructure competition; international banking centers; portfolio investments; tax competition |
| JEL: | G20 H40 H54 |
| Date: | 2011–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:8570&r=acc |
| By: | Guner, Nezih (MOVE, Barcelona); Kaygusuz, Remzi (Sabanci University); Ventura, Gustavo (Arizona State University) |
| Abstract: | Based on well-known evidence on labor supply elasticities, several authors have concluded that women should be taxed at lower rates than men. We evaluate the quantitative implications of taxing women at a lower rate than men. Relative to the current system of taxation, setting a proportional tax rate on married females equal to 4% (8%) increases output and married female labor force participation by about 3.9% (3.4%) and 6.9% (4.0%), respectively. Gender-based taxes improve welfare and are preferred by a majority of households. Nevertheless, welfare gains are higher when the U.S. tax system is replaced by a proportional, gender-neutral income tax. |
| Keywords: | taxation, two-earner households, labor force participation |
| JEL: | E62 H31 J12 J22 |
| Date: | 2011–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5962&r=acc |
| By: | Umut Unal (Department of Economics, Florida International University) |
| Abstract: | This paper characterizes the dynamic effects of net tax and government spending shocks on prices, interest rate, GDP and its private components in four OECD countries using a structural VAR approach. For the first time in this literature, I propose a structural decomposition of total net taxes into four components: corporate income taxes, income taxes, indirect taxes and social insurance taxes. The paper provides estimates of the responses of macroeconomic aggregates to innovations in these net tax components. The main conclusions of the analysis can be summarized as follows: 1) decompositions of total net tax innovations show that net tax components have different impacts on economic variables; 2) the size and persistence of these effects vary across countries depending upon the strength of wealth, substitution, and income effects reflecting the structure of the economies; 3) positive tax multipliers reported in previous studies are found only for the corporate income tax in the US, Canada, and France and for the social security tax in the US; 4) while we find that private investment is crowded out both by taxation and government spending in the UK and the US as consistent with the neo-classical model, our results for France and partially for Canada, indicate that there are opposite effects of tax and spending increases on private investment in line with Keynesian theory; and 5) private consumption is crowded in by government spending for all countries except the UK and crowded out by taxation in all countries except France. While the former result is consistent with a Keynesian model, the latter is in line with neo-classical theory. |
| Keywords: | Fiscal shocks, Structural vector autoregression, Tax policy |
| JEL: | E62 H20 H30 |
| Date: | 2011–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fiu:wpaper:1109&r=acc |
| By: | B. Ravikumar; Yuzhe Zhang |
| Abstract: | We study the optimal auditing of a taxpayer’s income in a dynamic principal- agent model of hidden income. Taxpayers in our model initially have low income and stochastically transit to high income that is an absorbing state. A low-income taxpayer who transits to high income can underreport his true income and evade his taxes. With a constant absolute risk-aversion utility function and a costly and imperfect auditing technology, we show that the optimal auditing mechanism in our model consists of cycles. Within each cycle, a low-income taxpayer is initially unaudited, but if the duration of low-income reports exceeds a threshold, then the auditing probability becomes positive. That is, the tax authority guarantees that the taxpayer will not be audited until the threshold duration is reached. We also find that auditing becomes less frequent if the auditing cost is higher or if the variance of income is lower. |
| Keywords: | Tax auditing ; Taxation |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedlwp:2011-020&r=acc |
| By: | Michael Keen |
| Abstract: | The financial crisis has prompted a reconsideration of the taxation of financial institutions, with practice outstripping principle: France, Germany, the United Kingdom and several other European countries have now introduced some form of bank tax, and the U.S. administration has revived its own proposal for such a charge. This paper considers the structure, appropriate rate, and revenue yield of corrective taxation of financial institutions addressed to two externalities, consequent on excessive risk-taking, prominent in the crisis: those that arise when such institutions are simply allowed to collapse, and those that arise when, to avoid the harm this would cause, their creditors are bailed out. It also asks whether corrective taxation or a regulatory capital requirement is the better way to address these concerns. The results suggest a potential role for taxing bank borrowing, perhaps as an adjunct to minimum capital requirements, at marginal rates that rise quite sharply at low capital ratios (but are likely lower when the government cannot commit to its bailout policy), reaching levels higher than those of the bank taxes so far adopted or proposed. |
| Date: | 2011–08–25 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:imf:imfwpa:11/206&r=acc |