Wage setting and tax progressivity in dynamic general equilibrium

This paper concerns the implications of progressive labor incometaxation for wage determination in dynamic general equilibrium.The main purpose is to analyze the general equilibrium effectsof increased tax progressivity in terms of the responses inthe real wage rate, employment, the capital stock, output andconsumption. Among the results, we find that increased tax progressivityincreases the real wage rate and decreases employment underboth union and competitive wage formation.     

Efficiency Wages,Interfirm Comparison,and Unemployment

The paper presents an efficiency wage model where worker effort depends on own wages relative both to wages of other workers in the firm and to similar workers in other firms. First, we show how the Solow conditions are modified if internal comparison effects are at work. Second, we discuss the effect of internal wage comparison on wage inequality within firms. Third, we study unemployment and relative wage determination within a general equilibrium model, and analyze the effect of technological change and various tax policies on equilibrium unemployment and relative wages. Finally, the short-run effects of aggregate demand shocks are analyzed.     

Can good events lead to bad outcomes? Endogenous banking crises and fiscal policy responses

In this paper, we study the impact of changes in the urban labor force and foreign direct investment on the banking sector, using a dynamic general equilibrium model with a financial sector. Numerical simulations are performed using stylized Chinese data, and bank failures are generated through increases in the growth rate of the labor force, a revaluation of the exchange rate, or an increase in debt issue to finance the government deficit, as compared to a benchmark scenario in which banks remain solvent. Thus bank failures can result from what might seem to be either beneficial economic trends or correct monetary and fiscal policies. We introduce fiscal policies that modify relative factor prices by lowering the capital tax rate and increasing the tax rate on labor. Such policies can prevent banking failures by raising the return to capital. It is shown that such fiscal policies are, in the short run, welfare reducing.     

International spillover effects of sectoral tax differentiation in unionized economies

Sectoral tax differentiation has in recent years appeared onthe agenda in European policy discussions concerning unemployment.The member countries of the European Union are allowed to reducethe value added tax rates on goods and services that are particularlylabour intensive and price elastic. This paper provides a theoreticalanalysis of the international repercussions of such policies.We develop a two-country and two-sector model with monopolisticcompetition in the goods market and wage bargaining in the labourmarket. Policy externalities operate through the endogenouslydetermined terms of trade. We examine how national and supranationalcommodity tax policies affect sectoral and total employmentand characterize optimal commodity taxes with and without internationalpolicy cooperation. Some rough estimates of the welfare gainsfrom policy coordination are also presented, using a calibratedversion of the model.     

非债务税盾与公司最优资本结构研究——对MM理论的扩展

文章在MM理论的基础上,引入有关企业所得税法更现实的条款,通过对证券市场供需双方一般均衡模型的建立,发现公司存在非债务税盾时,米勒的资本结构无关论并不成立。取而代之的是,债券和股票相对市场价格的不断调整,直到市场均衡时每个公司都具有唯一最优的资本结构。     

Jobs with different wage determination mechanisms, social efficiency and unemployment

The purpose of this paper is to construct a theoretical framework for the labor market, which is composed of a variety of jobs with different wage determination mechanisms. We identify an equilibrium in which some firms post a wage and others bargain with workers. This paper shows that the proportion of firms adopting wage bargaining in a decentralized equilibrium is below the socially optimal level. We identify policies to increase this proportion and to improve social efficiency. Furthermore, we examine the impact of those policies on unemployment. The results of this study will determine the direction of employment policy on the labor market with various employment styles.     

基础设施建设支出、结构性减税与最优政策选择

财政政策的最优政策选择问题对于国家宏观调控政策的出台具有指导意义。既往的研究忽略了利用动态一般均衡的方法探求具有双重外部性的基础设施建设支出与结构性减税支出的政策选择问题。本文利用引入基础设施建设支出和结构性减税的新凯恩斯DSGE模型,测算比较基建支出和结构性减税的政策福利效应。研究表明：具有双重外部性的基础设施建设支出不仅可以通过提高生产效率的方式促进产出,还可以通过挤入居民消费的方式加强政策福利效应。经过测算,短期的基建支出乘数大于结构性减税的政策乘数。同时,基建支出长期平均产出乘数小于结构性减税的平均产出乘数。与结构性减税政策相比,增加基建支出对于财政资金有限的政府是短期内更加有效的产出刺激政策,但在长期中,结构性减税政策不仅具有较高的政策效应,还可以从消费、劳动、投资等角度实现结构性政策目标。进一步研究发现,地区经济发展水平的不同会导致各地区的最优政策选择存在差异性：发达地区可以通过结构性税收政策解决结构性问题的同时实现长期经济增长;而欠发达地区则更应该注重运用基础设施建设为主的支出政策以促进经济增长;但随着人口逐渐从欠发达地区流出,提高欠发达地区的基建支出是否是可行之策,还需要考虑区域协调发展等诸多因素。     

Export taxes and income distribution: The Philippines coconut levy

Export Taxes and Income Distribution: The Philippines Coconut Levy. — A large, empirically based general equilibrium model of the Philippine economy is used to analyze the implications of a tax on coconut oil exports. The analysis shows how general equilibrium models can be used to derive optimal tax rates and to show the detailed relationship between the rates at which these taxes are applied and their economic effects. The analysis explores in particular the effects such taxes have on economic welfare and on income distribution within the country. The distributional effects of this export tax are shown to be highly regressive, revealing more clearly the policy trade-offs such taxes involve.     

The Later You Pay,the Higher the k

This paper shows the importance of the age path (life-cycle timing) of any tax for the accumulation of capital in the economy. Income, consumption, and wage taxes differ in their age paths as well as their incentive effects. This paper studies how the differing age path of each tax affects the capital accumulation of the economy in an empirically calibrated life-cycle model. We investigate lump-sum “age” taxes and find in every case that the later the person pays tax, the higher the k of the economy. To analyze the life-cycle timing effect of conventional transactions-based taxes (income, consumption, and wage), we replace each tax with a lump-sum age tax that has the identical age path of tax payments over the life cycle. We find that the timing effect is quantitatively important and often causes the impact of a tax on capital accumulation to be very different from what would be predicted from the incentive effect.     

The Equilibrium Rate of Unemployment in the Netherlands

The rise in unemployment in the 1970s and its subsequent persistence have challenged the conventional wisdom embodied in the standard Phillips curve, namely that equilibrium unemployment is fairly constant over time. This paper attempts to explain the apparent non-constancy of equilibrium unemployment by developing and estimating a structural model in which equilibrium unemployment is endogenous and results from the interactions of wage bargaining and the price and employment determination of firms. We find that the three major determinants of equilibrium unemployment are tax rates, the replacement rate and the real interest rate. The rise in unemployment in the 1970s and early 1980s was mainly due to a rise in the first two factors. That equilibrium unemployment remained high when tax rates and the replacement rate were reduced in the 1980s and early 1990s is attributed to the rise in real interest rates during this period.     

Tax reform,capital allocation and welfare gains in Norway

Summary This paper analyzes the potential welfare gains to the Norwegian economy of implementing a tax reform that broadens the tax base and lowers tax rates on capital income. For this purpose a dynamic general equilibrium model where agents have perfect foresight is developed. The model is highly aggregate, with only one production sector and one household sector, but it incorporates a very detailed treatment of the taxation of capital income. This includes a two-way classification of capital assets into three ownership classes: corporate, non-corporate and household, and across two types of assets: long-lived and short-lived. This suffices to capture those elements of the Norwegian tax code that give rise to the most important distortions, both intratemporally and intertemporally.I have benefited greatly from detailed comments from Don Fullerton, A. Lans Bovenberg and an anonymous referee. Please direct all correspondence to the author to: Fiscal Affairs Department, International Monetary Fund, 700 19th Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20431.     

Comparing the welfare effects of income and excise taxes in the presence of the other taxation paradox

This paper implements numerically a general equilibrium model in which all private producers are price makers and the government utilizes tax revenues to provide a public good. After deriving the partial equilibrium condition for an excise tax to increase price by more than the tax (for a monopoly firm), numerical examples are given, demonstrating this phenomenon for both partial and general equilibrium. In the general equilibrium context, optimal excise taxation and optimal flat-rate income taxation are compared. In the excise tax regime, prices increase by more than the taxes. In the income tax regime, prices actually decline relative to the no-tax regime. In all of the examples given, flat-rate income taxation is superior to excise taxation in terms of welfare. The author has benefitted from exceptionally helpful comments received from J. Ronnie Davis, John D. Wilson, Ralph W. Pfouts, and Amy Crews. He has also benefitted from conversations with Franz Gehrels, David E. Wildasin, Herbert J. Kiesling, and Harold York. The usual disclaimer applies.     

随机增长模型下的税收效应

Turalay Kenc(2004)在一个扩展的随机模型中(不假设常量的投资机会集)分析了资本收入税对增长率、资产组合份额、债券收益率的影响效应。本文在随机资产组合份额的情况下,利用Grinols和Turnovsky(1998)的模型和方法,对此也进行了研究。讨论了具有跨期最优化代理人、随机增长经济中的资本收入税效应,这里,政府可以通过税收、发行货币、发行债券来为它的支出融资。除了货币和政府的债券以外,消费者在他的财富中可以持有风险股票(资本)。得到的部分结论与Turalay Kenc(2004)的一致,也有部分结论不一致。此外,本文还分析了资本收入税对利率、通货膨胀率、本国投资率、福利的影响效应。本文得出的部分结论,尤其是与Turalay Kenc(2004)不一致的结论,在我国也得到了实证支持。     

International mobility of capital,wage indexation,and the cost of policy mistakes under ambiguity: a CGE evaluation

In this paper we focus on the role institutions and structural parameters play in macroeconomic policy design and test the differential effects of tax policies on two structural parameters: the degree of international capital mobility and the rules of wage indexation practiced in the economy. We evaluate counterfactual changes in taxation in the Argentine economy using a Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) Model with unemployment, calibrated with 2006 data, showing that policy mistakes (diagnosis failures) are costlier when the degree of capital mobility is greater and the rules to determine salaries could amplify the losses. Among other taxes, we evaluate the choice of export taxation, historically one of the preferred revenue sources of Argentine governments. We discuss the choice of taxes that an optimistic and a pessimistic policymaker will make under Knightian uncertainty and find that, in the case of our CGE, an optimistic policymaker prefers to tax export goods, while a more pessimistic one tends to tax imports or non-tradable goods.     

Pollution mitigation,unemployment rate and wage inequality in the presence of agricultural pollution

This paper established a small open general equilibrium model to investigate the effects of the changes of consumers' unit private mitigation expenditure on the unemployment rate and the urban-rural wage inequality etc.. We found that (1) in the capital specific case, the increase of unit private mitigation expenditure will not only increase the urban unemployment rate but also expend the urban-rural wage inequality; (2) in the capital movable case, the conclusions are exactly opposite to that of the capital specific case. And under certain conditions, the increase of unit private mitigation expenditure may improve national income. According to the parameter calibration and numerical simulation results of the relevant macroeconomic data of China in 2017, we also found that (3) the effects of the changes of unit private mitigation expenditure on the urban unemployment rate is greater than that of the urban-rural wage inequality; (4) the influence degree of the changes of unit private mitigation expenditure on the unemployment rate in the capital movable case is greater than that of the capital specific case, but the influence degree of the change of unit private mitigation expenditure on the urban-rural wage inequality in the capital movable case is smaller than that of the capital specific case.     

The Recent Performance of the UK Labour Market

We consider both the overall macroeconomic performance of theUK labour market since 1997, as well as some of the underlyingmicro problems, particularly those facing unskilled workers,On the macro front, we have seen unemployment decline to itslowest level for a generation without excessive inflationarypressure. The main factors behind this decline in equilibriumunemployment stem from actions taken by the previous government.Changes introduced in the labour market since 1997 are likelyto have only small effects on equilibrium unemployment. Underlyingthis favourable aggregate labour-market performance are seriousproblems facing unskilled men who have seen dramatic increasesin their unemployment and inactivity rates, concentrated particularlyin Wales and the northern regions of Britain. The policy responsesince 1997 has focused on encouraging the unskilled into work(the New Deal) while simultaneously raising the rewards forworking (the minimum wage, tax credits). These policies havehad a positive impact on youth employment and have significantlyreduced child poverty. So far, however, existing policies donot seem likely to have a serious impact on the high levelsof worklessness among unskilled men.     

两税合并对我国吸引外资的影响分析

两税合并主要是指对内外资企业所得税实行统一税法、统一税率、统一税前扣除标准、统一优惠政策。本文从对引进外资规模的影响和引进外资结构与投向两个方面分析了两税合并对我国吸引外资的影响。     

资本市场税收调控问题探析

本文主要结合现行税制中关于资本市场的税收政策,分析现行资本市场税收政策存在的不足,提出利用税收政策规范资本市场发展的对策建议。     

The need for economic policy coordination between Europe,Japan, and the United States: Policy recommendations for the 1990s

Better policy coordination between Europe, Japan, and the United States is urgently needed in order to restore economic growth and to diminish mutual trade imbalances. Using the EC Compact model it is shown how coordinated fiscal policies can contribute to reaching these goals in the 1990s. For Europe, the most plausible fiscal policy option seems to be a combination of lower direct taxes, public spending cuts, and wage moderation; for Japan a more expansionary fiscal policy is feasible. For the United States, however, public spending cuts or tax increases are necessary conditions for better economic performance. In addition, for all three blocks a swap between tax reduction and wage moderation is recommended.