Assessment Lags and Property Tax Impacts

Abstract . A major administrative problem of the property tax is the difficulty of maintaining current assessments. If real estate is not reassessed as market values change, then the real tax rates on market value will diverge from the statutory rates. Within any taxing jurisdiction those properties with the highest rate of increase in market value will be taxed at the lowest real rate, while those with the lowest (including negative) rate of increase in market value will be taxed at the highest real rate. This investigation develops a straightforward method for calculating differentials in effective tax rates and describes the economic impacts of these differentials.     

Community Classification and Growth in Effective Property Tax Rates: A Case Study of Rate Divergence in 39 Rhode Island Towns

Abstract . A multiple regression analysis of cross-sectional data for 39 Rhode Island towns indicates that variation in the level of effective property tax rates among communities can be substantially explained. The determinants are a community's population density, median family income, real property per capita, and the ratio of commercial to total property tax, revenue. Population density serves as a criterion for judging the “cityness” (1) of a community, that is, its degree of urbanization. A positive relationship exists between population density and effective property tax rate. Communities with the highest population density tend to have the highest tax rates. This relationship is shown in each analyzed year. Covariance analysis applied to the regression coefficients for the various years reveals a significant change in the population density coefficient. This coefficient change indicates a divergence in effective property tax rates among city, suburban, and rural communities.     

Alternative Methods of School Finance: An Empirical Analysis of Cities in San Diego County

. Two alternatives to the local school property tax are explored using a simulation model: a power equalizing property tax and a state-wide property tax. The effects on residents’tax burdens and service levels are estimated and compared for residents of 13 cities in San Diego County. Under each of the available options shifts in tax burdens would occur. One high income city is a major beneficiary. Three others which would be required to contribute more to education are otherwise dissimilar; one is already taxing itself heavily. When tax effort is considered, cities intended to be prime beneficiaries do benefit but not greatly. The principal gainer is a city with high income and high property values. This analysis does not indicate that these alternative programs are more equitable than the present property tax.     

Tourism, Vacation Home Development and Residential Tax Burden:

Abstract . Differences in property tax rates among communities within a regional economy are a source of inefficiency and inequity. Less developed rural areas where natural amenities exist have often attempted to use the tourist industry as a means of importing economic development. Promoters of vacation home development argue that the impact on the local tax base is positive. However, the quantitative research in this paper indicates that under certain circumstances, vacation home development has the effect of increasing the tax burden on residential property.     

Public Choice and Land Tax Fairness

Land value taxation (LVT) as desirable U.S. tax policy was brilliantly set forth by the American publicist and economist, Henry George, in the book Progress and Poverty, published 100 years ago. Economists concerned with state and local taxation have generally accepted the basic elements of George's analysis. The absence of substantial LVT legislation despite the economic efficiency and ethical strengths of land as a tax base arises from two sources. First, the public perception of land has not separated land's attributes from those possessed by other property. Second, land ownership data have not been gathered and publicized. Groups favoring taxes that promote economic justice and efficiency should support efforts to develop land ownership data. It would be an important first step toward fully utilizing the potential of LVT.     

An Address by a Georgist Sympathizer: Practical Issues in Georgist Thought

The justice and soundness of the taxation of land rent is acknowledged but problems in assessing imply a need to introduce better methods. This is particularly true when attempting to introduce the more saleable idea of two-rate tax systems because the allocation of total value of real estate parcels between land and buildings is even more arbitrarily done than determining the total assessment. The ideas fit best at the local level and there is little chance of replacing income or sales taxes. A 100% tax would be impossible since it would lead to an avalanche of tax appeals and the abandonment of some land since a high percentage of assessments are in error. The idea of a single tax does not fit modern times when revenue needs determine taxes, rather than the amount of revenue collected determining proper or necessary government expenditure levels. One tax source may be unpopular and regarded as a dangerous concept. Land is probably less important and less relatively valuable than it used to be because of technological change. Some advances in social legislation may mitigate the need for the drastic reform, George who was a moralist deeply concerned about poverty, felt reform was needed in his day. He was right about the impacts of various taxes on economic activity and income distribution.     

How Much Revenue Would a Full Land Value Tax Yield?In the United States in 1981, Census and Federal Reserve Data Indicate It Would Nearly Equal All Taxes

Abstract . Most urban economists and particularly specialists in urban public finance consider the land value tax, because of its economic effects and its influence toward rational development, the tax of choice. But could it replace, in whole or in large part, taxes which now burden labor and capital and distort efficient allocation of resources? How important would a full land rent tax's yield be? The U.S. Bureau of the Census provides data which, adjusted for errors and omissions, indicates that the annual land rent for 1981 was $721 billion. Federal Reserve Board data, similarly adjusted, indicates annual land rent for that year was $590.38 billion Hence we may say that a full land rent tax would yield something around $658 billion in 1981, or 28 percent of the 1981 national income. This is nearly two thirds of all taxes levied by all levels of government in 1981, and, with user charges and similar fees continued, it is probably equal or nearly equal to burdensome taxes.     

Groundwater and the Land Value Tax

Abstract . Application of the land value tax has been described for many natural resources. However, the problems encountered with flowing underground resources have not been fully discussed. Groundwater is one such flowing resource that affects the value of surface land. The underground water is also subject to its own market forces. If a Georgist tax is to be applied to groundwater or to land affected by it, the administrator of the tax must consider the interplay that occurs between the two resource markets. A system of separable property rights to the two resources offers the prospect for efficient use. But the monitoring of ground water use must accompany such a separation.     

The Vermont Land Gains Tax Experience With It Provides a Useful Lesson in the Design of Modern Land Policy

Abstract . Vermont is currently the only state which employs a special capital gains tax on certain land sales. A comparison between the Vermont land gains tax and Henry George's Single Tax provides a useful lesson in the design of modern land policy. The Vermont tax is aimed at discouraging short run land speculation, while the Single Tax seeks to discourage the long term quasimonopoly of land ownership. The Single Tax would capture unearned increments to land value while the Vermont tax applies only to realized capital gains and tends to reward long term speculators. An empirical analysis of the Vermont tax reveals that tax revenues have been small, and that the tax has not prevented a rise in land values. In fact, the Vermont tax may have increased land prices by restricting available land supply. Although the Vermont tax intended to curb speculation and reduce land subdivision activity, it is not a substitute for land use planning and carefully designed growth control ordinances and regulations.     

Site Value Taxation and Manvel's Land Value Estimates

Replacement of the existing property tax with a. tax on site value requires that the site value base be sufficiently large to generate the same revenue as the existing tax. The adequacy of the site value base is examined in view of Manvel's land value/property value estimates. The conclusion is that only partial replacement may be feasible in many cases, but this may still produce a desirable effect.     

Property Tax Circuit-breakers: Good Causes but Bad Economics

A bstract . Since 1965, 30 states and the District of Columbia have enacted programs designed to reduce the effective rate of property taxation for some low income households and for the elderly. Most often this relief is provided by so-called "circuit-breakers." It is contended that the economic arguments favoring circuit-breakers are empirically unproven and theoretically suspect. The tax may be progressive , not regressive , and the device may transfer income from low to high income households. Any short run redistribution of income to favor the poor or the elderly would, in the long run, merely shift the timing of their tax payments. Circuit-breakers encourage over-consumption of housing and misallocation of housing resources. Reducing the tax base, they produce higher rates and so increase the tax burden.     

Mineral Taxation in Jamaica: An Oligopoly Confronts Taxes on Resource Rents — and Prevails

Abstract . The reallocative effects on bauxite production in Jamaica following the imposition of an ad valorem tax in 1974 are considered. The international aluminum industry, being both vertically and horizontally integrated, evolved a successful strategy of time-phasing bauxite production capacity worldwide. The non-neutral tax not only made Jamaican bauxite uncompetitive with the output of other producers but also eroded the cost differential between bauxite and alternative sources of aluminum ore. The study claims that the consequences of the tax have been disastrous, and it argues that the ad valorem tax on the recovered ore must be replaced by some form of a profits-based tax.     

Henry George the Classical Model and Technological Change:*The Ignored Alternative to the Single Tax in Progress and Poverty

Abstract . Henry George's vision of land monopolization as the source of growing rentier income was compatible with all elements in the predominant Ricardian-Millian classical distribution model except the rent-reducing effects of technological change and Malthusian population growth as the catalyst underlying income distribution. Since George also rejected Malthusianism on ethical and philosophical grounds, his analysis focused on the autonomous nature of rent income with respect to population and technological change. George analyzed the distributive consequences of both increasing technology with constant population, and constant technology with increasing population. In the latter case, George, in an ultimate rejection of Malthusianism, demonstrated an optimistic increasing returns to scale of population growth. However, although capable, George never considered a logical extension of his analysis, namely, the dynamic case of changing population, technology, and increasing returns. This analysis would have contradicted his predictions of the trend in relative income shares and the uniqueness of the single tax as the solution to social and economic distress.     

新企业所得税法下的纳税筹划

新企业所得税法对原企业所得税相关政策进行了重大调整,企业应在深入研究和分析新企业所得税各项条款的基础上,进行有效的纳税筹划,从而给企业带来节税效应。     

Federal Income Tax Reform in the United States: How Did It Happen? What Did It Do? Where Do We Go from Here?

Abstract . The 16th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1913 provided the legal basis for progressive federal income taxes. They now yield revenues of about $450 billion annually. Tax base erosion eventually produced a levy in serious violation of norms of allocation efficiency, distributional equity, and macroeconomic performance. Vested private interests influenced legislators by propaganda and campaign contributions to minimize their tax burdens at the expense of less wealthy taxpayers. The result was an irrational and badly flawed tax structure. In 1981 the maximum marginal tax rate on income from property and wealth was significantly reduced along with other bracket reductions. The income tax reform movement culminated in 1984 to 1986. It expanded the base of the tax while reducing marginal rates as well as brackets, with little change in the distribution of the burden among different income groups but achieving some greater equity in tax liabilities for those with similar incomes.     

完善我国研发支出的财税政策

随着经济发展,研发创新活动已经成为各国竞争的重要手段之一。科技创新可以优化一个国家的资源配置,提高国家的综合竞争力。各国政府为了研发创新活动的开展,都在积极探索并制定研发创新的财税政策。本文分析了我国目前研发支出财税政策存在的不足之处,如财税政策的受益范围窄且力度小、财税支持方式不合理及法律法规不健全等问题。接着介绍国外激励研发创新的财税政策,总结出对我国财税政策的启示。最后从扩大财税政策激励范围、丰富财税政策激励方式以及完善我国财税的法律法规等方面提出优化我国研发支出财税政策的建议。     

Tax avoidance and business location in a state border model

Previous studies have struggled to demonstrate that higher taxes deter business activity. We revisit this issue by estimating the effect of changes over time in cross-border differences in state tax conditions on the tendency for new establishments to favor one side of a state border over the other. Identification is enhanced by taking account of previously overlooked reciprocal agreements that require workers to pay income tax to their state of residence as opposed to their state of employment. When reciprocal agreements are in force, higher personal income tax rates lure companies from across the border, while corporate income tax and sales tax rates have the opposite effect. Where reciprocal agreements are not in place, the results are largely reversed. These patterns are amplified in heavily developed locations, and differ in anticipated ways by industry and corporate/non-corporate status of the establishment. Overall, results strengthen the view that state-level tax policies do affect the location decisions of entrepreneurs and new business activity, but not in a way that lends itself to a one-size-fits-all summary.     

Property Tax Assessment Reform: A Source of Local Revenue Windfall or Fiscal Retrenchment

Abstract . Researchers, state officials and taxpayers have often speculated that property tax assessment reform would lead to an increase in the overall tax burden. They contend that, given the large non-discretionary increase in the tax base during the reform, local governments can raise more resources without increasing the nominal tax rate. An empirical analysis of 74 towns in New York supports that position. However, two types of tax shifts that occurred in the wake of reassessment—interclass shifts of tax burden to the owners of residential propertieskovn the other property classes and intra-class shifts observed among residential property owners—have caused significant moderation in this pattern of local government behavior. Therefore, tax reform, while it bestows revenue windfalls upon some local governments, may require fiscal retrenchment by others.     

Executive Compensation in Japan: Estimating Levels and Determinants from Tax Records

Most studies of executive compensation have data on pay but not total income. Because exchange‐listed Japanese firms (unlike exchange‐listed U.S. firms) need not disclose executive compensation figures in their securities filings, most studies on Japan lack even good data on pay. Through 2004, however, the Japanese tax office disclosed the tax liabilities of the 73,000 Japanese with the highest incomes. We obtained this data, and match the high‐tax list against the list of CEOs of the firms listed in Section 1 of the Tokyo Stock Exchange. We thus estimate salaries and risk exposure in a new way. We confirm survey and anecdotal evidence that Japanese executives earn less than American—about one‐fifth the pay, adjusting for firm size and outside income. Tobit regressions show that pay in Japan depends heavily on firm size (a .22 elasticity) and on accounting profitability, but not on stock returns. Additionally, family owned firms and those with large lead shareholders pay less to employee CEOs not in the family or with large shareholdings, as do firms whose directors have less tenure on the board.     

Eliminating Housing Tax Preferences: A Distributional Analysis

We examine the distributional impact of potential changes in the tax treatment of owner-occupied housing in this paper. In particular, we focus on the removal of mortgage interest and local property tax deductibility. A theoretical model of the demand for housing is developed that captures the impact of removing these deductions on housing demand. Then, we use a large cross section of individual income tax returns from the Internal Revenue Service for 1990 to estimate the distributional effects of removing housing deductions. Taxpayers are ranked by income and tax liability, both with and without the housing deductions. By comparing tax liability under the alternative regimes, and composing measures of the distributional impact of removing housing tax deductions using the classic Suits index, we assess both revenue neutral and nonrevenue neutral distributional effects. Results in both cases indicate that the removal of the tax deductibility of mortgage interest and property taxes would increase the progressivity of the income tax substantially.