In Italy, the Regular Grant is the most important subsidy to private cultural institutions. Since 1996, law 534/96 has regulated its provision. This law greatly improves on the previous legislation, as it redefines the prerequisites to become a recipient and specifies performance indicators to which the size of the grant must be tied. This paper examines the effects of the introduction of the new law, the characteristics of the government choice process and the redistribution profile of these grants using a variety of estimating techniques on official data gathered for the purpose.
This paper aims at analyzing the distributional (and revenue) effects of the deviations of the personal income tax (PIT) base in Italy from the taxpayer’s total income that was proposed as tax base by the Commission for the Study of Tax Reform in 1964 (which was inspired by the Schanz-Haig-Simons concept of income). It is clear in both the Report of the Commission and Cosciani’s writings that an equitable tax system requires that all income items are taxed within the PIT. However, financial income in Italy is excluded from the PIT since its introduction in 1974, and the erosion of the PIT base has continued to date. In the second part of the paper the contribution of the different types of income to the PIT base in Italy with respect to GDP between 1980 and 2012 is analyzed, and an assessment of the redistributive effect of the hypothetical inclusion of financial income in the PIT base is provided, using data from tax returns for 2010
This article analyzes the relationship between the mix of cash transfers and in-kind goods provided by local governments and the local population size and individual preferences. On theoretical grounds, the traditional theory of fiscal federalism and recent contributions on both the local jurisdictions and the breaking up of nations assume that (subcentral) governments provide a single public good, ignoring expenditure composition. However, central and local governments provide both cash and in-kind goods. We propose a simple theoretical model assuming that local governments provide a composite good, formed by money transfers and in-kind services, and that preferences vary across population due to different individual income levels. Normative and positive outcomes are derived and compared assuming a centrally determined expenditure ceiling. Measures designed to move the actual policy mix closer to the optimal one are envisaged. A scenario characterized by a fully decentralized two-step decision process is also analyzed.
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