EFFECTS OF TAXES AND BENEFITS ON INCOME DISTRIBUTION IN KOREA

This paper examines the redistributive effects of Korea's fiscal policies, including consumption taxes and in‐kind benefits. Using the Household Income and Expenditure Survey of 2007, we find that taxes and transfers reduce income inequality in Korea by 13.8 percent. Contrary to the popular belief that direct taxes are the key tool for redistribution, in‐kind benefits, direct taxes, and social security contributions all decrease the Gini coefficient by 6.7, 4.7, and 2.9 percentage points, respectively. The redistributive effect of consumption taxes is small and negative (?0.5 percentage point). Policy simulations indicate that education spending financed by the personal income tax has a positive redistributive effect and that the lower 70 percent of households enjoy positive net benefits. Spending targeting the poor has a strong redistributive effect, which implies low popularity because the majority of households face net losses.     

Benefit-induced female sole parenthood in Australia, 1973-85

The supporting mothers' benefit, introduced into Australia's Social Security Act in 1973, made nonwidowed single mothers eligible for direct Commonwealth transfer payments after a 6 month waiting period from date of separation or birth. The number of sole parent beneficiaries reached 176,730 by 1986, with an annual outlay of over US$1.3 billion. In essence, the supporting parents' benefits program legitimizes and facilitates pursuing a career as a single parent. Econometric estimates of the effects of economic and program-related variables on the benefits participation rates of Australian women during the 1973-86 period suggest that the program has had a substantial effect on several margins of individual choice. The outcome for the individual depends on economic, preference, and demographic variables for individuals, their potential or actual spouses, grandparents, and the benefits and eligibility characteristics of the government's parenting support system. In specifying a female sole parent supply function, the appropriate dependent variable is the female beneficiary participation rate--the number of supporting mother beneficiaries as a percentage of the population aged 15 years and over. Time series analysis suggests that, while the eligible population of lone females heading income units was growing before the 1973 introduction of the benefit scheme, there was also a substantial rise in this eligible population after 1973. However, this rise was less than the rise in female supporting parent beneficiaries between 1974-84. It appears that the female beneficiary rate has increased both because the eligible population of lone females heading income units increased in total and as a proportion of the female population and because of an increase in the benefit participation of those eligible. The data further provide evidence of relative wage and discouraged worker effects; coefficients of the weekly real value of benefits and supplementary assistance relative to female wages and the lagged female unemployment rate are positive.     

The effects of education on spouses’ satisfaction in Europe

This article identifies the effects of both own and spouses' education levels on individual economic satisfaction for European households. To that end, it estimates several specifications based on the family collective approach, for each of the 14 EU countries, by using the eight waves of the European Community Household Panel, 1994–2001. After demonstrating that the IV Hausman–Taylor procedure is the selected estimation method in the majority of cases, the empirical results show that male and female income satisfaction significantly increases when the husband achieves higher education qualifications in the majority of European countries. However, the positive effect of the wife's higher education on female income satisfaction only appears in a very limited number of countries. Additionally, increases in individual wage and nonwage incomes generally lead to higher satisfaction levels.     

The Impact of Health, Education and Housing Outlays upon Income Distribution in Australia in the 1990s

The distributional impact of public expenditure on such programs as health, education and housing is frequently ignored in studies of income distribution. This may bias assessment of both the relative living standards of different types of families at any particular point in time and of trends in income inequality over time. This article provides estimates for the 1990s of the combined distributional impact of public outlays on health, education and housing. The analysis indicates that the major beneficiaries of public outlays on these services are families with children and the aged. The pattern of receipt shows a strong life-cycle effect, with the value of non-cash benefits peaking in the 30s and 40s and rising again in retirement. Non-cash benefits are also shown to have an equalising effect upon income distribution.     

How responsive is body weight to transitory income changes? Evidence from rural Tanzania

We use time-series of rainfall to estimate the response of body weight to transitory changes in household income in rural Tanzania. We find that the response of body weight to income changes is positive on average, but that the impact is highest for female children, and lower for adults. For female children, a ten-percent increase in household income implies an increase in body weight by about 0.4 kg. In contrast, the body weight of adolescents and young adults is virtually invariant to income changes.     

The effect of government expenditure on the environment:An empirical investigation

This paper examines the impact of government spending on the environment using a panel of 77 countries for the time period 1980–2000. We estimate both the direct and indirect effects of government spending on pollution. The indirect effect in particular operates through the impact of government spending on income and the subsequent effect of the income level on pollution. To take into account the dynamic nature and the potential endogeneity in the relationships examined, appropriate econometric methods are used. For SO₂, government spending is estimated to have a negative direct impact on per capita emissions, while the direct effect is insignificant on CO₂ pollution. The indirect effect on SO₂ is negative for low income levels and becomes positive as income increases, while it remains negative for CO₂ for the most part of the sample range. The resultant total effects follow the patterns of the indirect effects, which dominate their respective direct ones for each pollutant. Policy implications from the results vary depending on the income level of the considered countries.     

Institutional Quality Mediates the Effect of Human Capital on Economic Performance

This paper considers the relationship between institutional quality, educational outcomes, and economic performance. More specifically, we seek to establish the linkages by which government effectiveness affects per capita income via its mediating impact on human capital formation. Our empirical approach adopts a two‐stage strategy that estimates national‐level educational production functions that include government effectiveness as a covariate, and uses these estimates as instruments for human capital in cross‐country regressions of per capita income. Our results identify a significant and positive effect of human capital on per capita income levels, and partially resolves the inconsistency between macro‐ and micro‐level studies of the effect of human capital on income. The results remain robust to alternative specifications, extension to a panel setting, subsamples of the data and fully endogenous institutions.     

The Politics of Foreign Aid: A Median Voter Perspective

The paper presents a model where the median voter in the donor country determines the support of foreign aid. It is first established that an individual in the donor country is affected by the direct benefits (due to altruism) and costs (due to taxes) of giving aid, and by the indirect benefits or costs of a change in the terms of trade. Then it is shown that the latter effect works through changing both the donor country's average income and its distribution of income. Given the stylized facts of a capital-abundant donor country and relatively capital-poor median voter, it is shown how redistribution-of-income effects soften the impact of terms-of-trade changes on the political support for foreign aid.     

Intergenerational transmission of education in China: New evidence from the Chinese Cultural Revolution

This paper estimates the effect of parental education on children's education by using instruments generated by the Chinese Cultural Revolution, and further explores the mechanisms of this causal relationship. Several important findings stand out from our empirical analyses. We find a larger intergenerational persistence in education for higher level in urban areas but for a lower level of education in rural areas. The main results from instrumental variable estimation show that the nurture effect is larger and more significant for fathers than for mothers. A deeper investigation of the mechanism behind this nurture effect informs us that a father's education passes on to his children's education partly through the income channel. Another notable finding is that even after controlling for fathers’ income, parental education still has a significantly positive effect on children's education through the nurture effect. This indicates that beyond the income channel, there may exist other channels such as better home environment, which deserve to be explored in future research.     

HUMAN WELL-BEING EFFECTS OF INSTITUTIONS AND SOCIAL CAPITAL

We examine the effects of income, institutions, and social capital—proxied by the level of corruption and ethnic tensions—on literacy and life expectancy in Africa. Random effects estimates show that income has a robust positive influence. GMM estimates indicate that corruption reduces the effectiveness of institutions in promoting literacy. However, this effect is not monotonic; improvements in the corruption index within the high corruption range reduce the effectiveness of institutions, while continuous improvement within the low corruption range enhances the effectiveness of institutions. Similarly, ethnic tensions reduce the effectiveness of institutions. Based on these findings, we conclude that social capital and institutions can complement each other. ( JEL O11, O17, Z13)     

Do natural resources help or hinder development? Resource abundance,dependence, and the role of institutions

The resource curse literature presents conflicting evidence on the relationship between natural resources and development. We evaluate the direct effect of resources on developmental outcomes vis-à-vis their indirect effect through the weakening of political institutions using a 3SLS instrumental variable setup that simultaneously estimates development outcomes and institutions. We find that resource abundance and resource dependence affect development outcomes through different channels. While resource abundance generally has a direct positive effect on developmental outcomes, resource dependence has a stronger negative indirect effect that operates through its negative impact on institutional quality. The results also depend on the type of development outcome considered, with more consistent positive direct effects found for physical capital measures and stronger negative indirect effects for human capital development. The use of a simultaneous framework and dual measures of resources reconciles seemingly contradictory findings in earlier work.     

Income inequality, consumption, and social-status seeking

Using the Chinese Urban Household Survey data between 1997 and 2006, we find that income inequality has a negative (positive) effect on household consumption net of education expenditures (savings) even after we control for household income. We argue that people save to improve their social status when social status is associated with pecuniary and non-pecuniary benefits. Rising income inequality can strengthen the incentives of status-seeking savings by increasing the benefit of improving status, and by enlarging the wealth level required for status upgrading. We also find that the negative effect of income inequality on consumption is stronger for poorer and younger people and that income inequality stimulates more education investment, which are consistent with the status-seeking hypothesis.     

贸易开放、人力资本与 中国区域收入空间效应* ——基于地级及以上行政区域经验数据分析

本文基于中国326个地级及以上行政区域2010-2012年的数据,利用空间杜宾增长模型（SDM）来测算贸易开放对中国区域人均收入的影响。本文测算了各个区域贸易开放和人力资本对人均收入水平的直接、间接和总影响。结果表明：一个区域的贸易开放程度越高越能促进当地经济的发展,对相邻区域的人均收入也会产生正的影响。同时笔者也发现,人力资本对中国各个区域的经济增长会产生正的直接和间接影响。     

碳税对我国城镇居民收入分配的累退效应与碳补贴方案设计

本文以碳税的收入分配效应为研究对象,将碳税的收入分配效应分解为直接效应与间接效应,采用《中国统计年鉴2011》、《中国城市统计年鉴2010》、《2007年投入产出表》相关数据,运用收入支出法、投入产出表原理测算了两种效应作用下的我国碳税累退性情况,进而在综合效应分析的基础上,模拟测算两种碳税补贴政策对累退性的纠正效应。测算结果表明,碳税的征收存在明显的累退性,其中,直接效应与间接效应对碳税累退性的贡献不同,直接效应贡献更大,可以解释大部分累退性。同时,按收入水平的有梯度的碳税补贴政策对纠正累退性效果更为显著。     

中国均衡性转移支付对地方政府收入行为的激励效应评估*——基于动态空间工具变量与空间杜宾模型分析

本文基于全国县级面板数据，采用动态空间工具变量模型和空间杜宾模型，从地方政府收入行为视角对均衡性转移支付的激励效应进行评估。结果表明：均衡性转移支付对地方政府收入行为具有双重作用。在直接效应方面，其在一定程度上缓解了地方政府的财政压力，且不会对地方政府造成直接税收扭曲影响。但在间接效应方面，均衡性转移支付会引致地区间扭曲的税收竞争。其产生的税基效应和税率效应相互抵消，对地方政府的征税努力的影响不显著，对地方政府的财政收入行为呈现中性影响，并未产生正向激励效应。     

Consumer sentiment and countercyclical fiscal policies

We re‐explore the consequences of some popular countercyclical intervention rules in a simple Keynesian‐type macroeconomic model in which the dynamics of consumer sentiment and business cycles are intertwined. We find that fiscal policy does not only have a direct effect on national income via the well‐known Keynesian multiplier process but also an indirect effect by affecting consumer sentiment. The good news is that the indirect effect may amplify the direct effect and therefore increases a policy‐maker’s impact on national income. However, the bad news is that due to the interactions between the business cycle and the evolution of consumer sentiment, the stabilization of national income is an intricate matter.     

中国均衡性转移支付对地方政府收入行为的激励效应评估*——基于动态空间工具变量与空间杜宾模型分析

本文基于全国县级面板数据,采用动态空间工具变量模型和空间杜宾模型,从地方政府收入行为视角对均衡性转移支付的激励效应进行评估。结果表明：均衡性转移支付对地方政府收入行为具有双重作用。在直接效应方面,其在一定程度上缓解了地方政府的财政压力,且不会对地方政府造成直接税收扭曲影响。但在间接效应方面,均衡性转移支付会引致地区间扭曲的税收竞争。其产生的税基效应和税率效应相互抵消,对地方政府的征税努力的影响不显著,对地方政府的财政收入行为呈现中性影响,并未产生正向激励效应。     

Foreign direct investment in a world of multiple taxes

Governments impose multiple taxes on foreign investors, though studies of the effect of tax policy on the location of foreign direct investment (FDI) focus almost exclusively on corporate income taxes. This paper examines the impact of indirect (non-income) taxes on FDI by American multinational firms, using affiliate-level data that permit the introduction of controls for parent companies and affiliate industries. Indirect tax burdens significantly exceed the foreign income tax obligations of foreign affiliates of American companies. Estimates imply that 10% higher local indirect tax rates are associated with 7.1% lower affiliate assets, which is similar to the effect of 10% higher income tax rates. Affiliate output falls by 2.9% as indirect taxes rise by 10%, while higher income taxes have more modest output effects. High corporate income tax rates depress capital/labor ratios and profit rates of foreign affiliates, whereas high indirect tax rates do not. These patterns reveal the impact of indirect taxes and suggest the mechanisms by which direct and indirect taxes affect FDI.     

Cross-country output convergence and growth: Evidence from varying coefficient nonparametric method

This article uses a nonparametric varying coefficient panel data model to study the convergence of real GDP per capita among 120 world economies for the sample period of 1980–2010. The estimates show that the indirect contribution of initial income via the control variables is important. The mediating effect of control variables to affect growth is positive. The conditional speed of convergence is larger than the absolute counterpart at all levels of initial income. The convergence hypothesis does not hold for economies with extremely low level of development. The conclusion is robust for regional subsamples of Europe, Asia, Latin America and Africa.     

我国城镇居民的健康需求与Grossman模型——来自截面数据的证据

本文从人力资本的角度用Grossman模型来分析我国城镇居民的健康需求。利用中国健康和营养调查(2000)数据,我们有以下主要发现:(1)与收入的不平等形成对比,城镇居民健康状况的分布比较均衡;(2)女性的教育程度对健康有正的影响,而男性的教育程度对健康的影响不显著;(3)年龄对男性健康的影响比女性大;(4)收入或工资水平对健康的影响不显著。总体而言女性比男性更符合Grossman模型的预测。