Optimal redistributive taxation when government's and agents' preferences differ

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Paternalism, merit goods and specific egalitarianism are concepts we sometimes meet in the literature. The thing in common is that the policy maker does not fully respect the consumer sovereignty principle and designs policies according to some other criterion than individuals' preferences. Using the self-selection approach to tax problems developed by Stiglitz (1982) and Stern (1982), the paper provides a characterization of the properties of an optimal redistributive mixed tax scheme in the general case when the government evaluates individuals' well-being using a different utility function than the one maximized by private agents. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor mayJEL Code: H21, H23.

Asymmetric and non-atmospheric consumption externalities, and efficient consumption taxation

“…8 That is, we assume that the marginal utility of consuming the status good relative to that of leisure increases in the reference level.…”

Pawns and queens revisited: public provision of private goods when individuals make mistakes

“…This question is analysed in a welfarist case by Blomquist and Christiansen (1998). 16 The latter formulation is similar to one in Blomquist and Micheletto (2005).…”

“…The optimal tax treatment of merit goods, but not their optimal public provision, is analysed by Sandmo (1983), Besley (1988), Racionero (2001), and Schroyen (2005). 6 The paper proceeds as follows. To highlight the main intuition, Section 2 presents a benchmark model where all individuals are assumed to be similarly irrational.…”

Taxation and Political Stability

“…Taxation, as noted, may have indirect relationships with political instability in complex regimens (Bischoff and Gohout, 2010). In any case, when institutions are subordinated to radical struggles between factions or political parties, the tax is at risk of being godless by taxpayers or the sensors are installed in revenue, ready to devour the budget (Blomquist and Micheletto, 2006). Then, the corrections made to the fiscal policy effects are not always assertive on the general policies of public spending.…”