Laffer strikes again: Dynamic scoring of capital taxes

We set up a neoclassical growth model extended by a corporate sector, an investment and finance decision of firms, and a set of taxes on capital income. We provide analytical dynamic scoring of taxes on corporate income, dividends, capital gains, other private capital income, and depreciation allowances and identify the intricate ways through which capital taxation affects tax revenue in general equilibrium. We then calibrate the model for the US and explore quantitatively the revenue effects from capital taxation. We take adjustment dynamics after a tax change explicitly into account and compare with steady-state effects. We find, among other results, a self-financing degree of corporate tax cuts of about 70–90% and a very flat Laffer curve for all capital taxes as well as for tax depreciation allowances. Results are strongest for the tax on capital gains. The model predicts for the US that total tax revenue increases by about 0.3–1.2% after abolishment of the tax.     

Current Account Adjustment and Capital Flows*

We examine episodes of current account adjustment in industrial countries over the past 30 years. We find that they were typically associated with a sizable growth slowdown and a large exchange rate depreciation. There was no discernible change in the nature of capital flows just prior to an adjustment. Hence, adjustments may be responding to the resolution of domestic imbalances rather than being an exogenous event. We show that global developments triggered the adjustment, possibly by triggering the unwinding of the domestic imbalances. Most of the ex post adjustment of the financial account was in private sector flows, primarily by foreign investors.     

Occupational Mobility and Wage Inequality

In this article we argue that wage inequality and occupational mobility are intimately related. We are motivated by our empirical findings that human capital is occupation specific and that the fraction of workers switching occupations in the U.S. was as high as 16% a year in the early 1970's and had increased to 21% by the mid-1990's. We develop a general equilibrium model with occupation-specific human capital and heterogeneous experience levels within occupations. We find that the model, calibrated to match the level of occupational mobility in the 1970's, accounts quite well for the level of (within-group) wage inequality in that period. Next, we find that the model, calibrated to match the increase in occupational mobility, accounts for over 90% of the increase in wage inequality between the 1970's and the 1990's. The theory is also quantitatively consistent with the level and increase in the short-term variability of earnings.     

家庭借贷约束、公共教育支出与社会流动性

人力资本投资是增强社会流动性的重要手段,然而借贷约束使得底层家庭无力对子女进行最优的人力资本投资;与此同时,富裕家庭则不受借贷约束的影响,总体结果是社会流动性减弱。利用中国健康与养老追踪调查和全国综合社会调查数据,本文发现,借贷约束确实提高了居民收入和教育的代际传递弹性,降低了社会流动性。在匹配政府公共教育支出数据后发现,公共教育支出可以缓解家庭层面人力资本投资的不足,提高教育水平的代际流动性。     

When income differences hurt or excite: The nonlinear effect of regional inequality on subjective wellbeing

Combining information from the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions and the European Social Survey, we investigate the relationship between subjective well-being and income inequality using regional inequality indicators and individual data. We assume that inequality aversion and perception of social mobility affect the impact of regional inequality on subjective well-being in opposite directions. We find evidence of an inverse U-shaped effect of inequality, where inequality starts to have a positive effect on subjective well-being that becomes negative with a switch point before the average of the Gini index for the entire sample. The rationale for our nonlinear finding is that Hirschman's tunnel effect (and the positive effect of perceived social mobility) prevails for low levels of inequality, while inequality aversion and negative relative income effects are relatively stronger when inequality is higher. Robustness checks on different sample splits are consistent with the hypothesis of the two drivers.     

Unfair inequality and growth*

Fighting against economic inequality is one fundamental social goal in the agendas of most governments. However, recent studies highlight that people actually prefer unequal societies, as they accept inequality generated by an individual's effort and wish to reduce only unfair inequality (generated by factors beyond an individual's control). This distinction might help to explain the fundamental unsolved question about whether inequality is good or bad for growth: unfair inequality (UI) could be growth-deterring, while fair inequality (FI) might be growth-enhancing. We derive a reduced-form growth equation from a stylized overlapping-generations model with human capital that includes FI, UI, and poverty. Then, using an instrumental variable approach, we show for alternative samples and inequality measures at the worldwide level that the estimated coefficient associated with UI is always negative, while the coefficient of total inequality increases when UI is included in the regression. Moreover, we find that poverty mediates this relationship because the higher the poverty rate, the smaller the impact of either type of inequality on growth.     

Unequal skill premiums and trade liberalization: Is education the missing link?

We examine the impact of increased trade on wage inequality in developing countries; whether higher human capital stocks moderate this effect. We find countries with a higher level of initial human capital experience less increased wage inequality following increased trade.     

Optimal adjustment paths in a monetary union

What to do when a country experiences a sudden stop in capital inflows and has to adjust externally? Sticky wages make adjustment to an external imbalance more difficult within a monetary union. Periods of high unemployment are usually necessary to achieve the required real depreciation (internal devaluation). Gradual adjustment is usually recommended to distribute the output and employment cost over time. But a gradual adjustment also implies that current account deficits persist for longer, leading to higher debt, and higher debt-service costs. The optimal path of price and wage adjustment thus involves a trade-off between the pain (unemployment) and the gain (lower debt) from adjustment. A simple model shows the determinants of the optimal path in terms of deeper parameters, such as the slope of the Phillips curve and the degree of openness. The rules for the resolution of future crises within the euro area should take this into account. Gradual adjustment is not always the optimal choice, and sometimes the alternative path of introducing abrupt changes produces the desired results.     

Aggregate returns to social capital: Estimates based on the augmented augmented-Solow model

We extend the augmented-Solow model to estimate the aggregate output elasticity and depreciation rate of social capital that characterize aggregate returns. The estimated output elasticity is approximately 0.1. While social capital positively affects economic growth, the magnitude is much smaller than that of other production inputs. The estimated depreciation rate is at least 10% per annum, which is higher than that of physical capital. The median value of the implied aggregate return of social capital is approximately 19.11% at the global level. In OECD countries, it is likely to be considerably smaller than the individual returns, suggesting the fallacy of composition. While there is no systematic relationship between GDP per capita and returns to physical or human capital, the aggregate returns to social capital seem to be negatively related to the level of development.     

Does income inequality hinder economic growth? New evidence using Australian taxation statistics

Using taxation statistics, we first derive consistently defined Gini coefficients for the period 1942–2013 for Australia as a whole as well as its eight states and territories. While income inequality exhibited a downward trend until 1979, it has since been on the rise not only over time, but also across states and territories. We then proceed to examine the effect of inequality on economic growth after controlling for changes arising from investment in physical and human capital using available panel data across all states and territories (1986–2013). We find that inequality adversely affects economic growth with a couple of years delay, an outcome consistent with similar studies undertaken in the United States and Europe. Our findings suggest that policymakers can address rising income inequality by implementing measures that support, and enhance, human capital accumulation given its long-run economic and social benefits.     

教育融资体制对代际流动性与不平等程度的动态影响：基于OL G模型的分析

传统的代际流动性研究并没有对代际流动性的短期值和长期值作有效区分,也未考虑人力资本形成中的不确定性,因而“代际流动性越高则不平等程度越低”这一分析结论并未在中国的现实中呈现。文章据此通过构建一个代际交叠模型比较分析了公共教育体制和市场教育体制下的代际流动性。模型动态分析发现：(1)公共教育体制下的不平等程度的长期值比市场教育体制下更低。(2)代际流动性短期值的升高并不总是伴随着不平等程度的下降,当社会受到某种剧烈冲击时可能发生两者同升同降的情况。(3)政府进行激进式的教育体制改革会使人力资本收敛速率发生跃升,并且使不平等程度的短期值和长期值都增大,而代际流动性则会在突降后在逐渐收敛到新的更低的稳态值。(4)人力资本积累不确定性参数值反映了个体不可观测的技能或先天禀赋,是影响代际流动性和不平等程度的重要因素。不确定性的突然上升会使不平等程度的短期值迅速上升,并且会使不平等程度的长期值达到新的高位,虽然代际流动性短期值也会迅速上升,但依旧会逐渐收敛到以前的稳态值不变。文章的研究有益于厘清代际流动性与不平等程度的复杂关系,也能为相关实证研究提供参考。     

Capital mobility and sustainability: Evidence from U.S. current account data

We propose an empirical framework that allows us to jointly test for the sustainability of the current account deficit and evaluate the capital mobility thesis by examining the time series properties of the current account. We argue that this approach is more useful than the Feldstein-Horioka (1980) cross-section regression because of its firm basis on the long run inter-temporal budget constraint and of its richer dynamics that allow for a more useful method to evaluate the capital mobility thesis. Based on a century and half of U.S. current account data, we find evidence of current account sustainability and major breaks in the current account dynamics such that adjustment in the current account switches off allowing the current account to accumulate at a non-stationary rate. We assess whether periods in which the current account accumulates in a non-stationary way correspond to historical periods believed to have witnessed high degree of capital mobility.First version received: June 2003/ Final version received: January 2004     

Human capital, economic growth, and regional inequality in China

We show how regional growth patterns in China depend on regional differences in physical, human, and infrastructure capital as well as on differences in foreign direct investment (FDI) flows. We also evaluate the impact of market reforms, especially the reforms that followed Deng Xiaoping's “South Trip” in 1992 those that resulted from serious hardening of budget constraints of state enterprises around 1997. We find that FDI had a much larger effect on TFP growth before 1994 than after, and we attribute this to the encouragement of and increasing success of private and quasi-private enterprises. We find that human capital positively affects output and productivity growth in our cross-provincial study. Moreover, we find both direct and indirect effects of human capital on TFP growth. These impacts of education are more consistent than those found in cross-national studies. The direct effect is hypothesized to come from domestic innovation activities, while the indirect impact is a spillover effect of human capital on TFP growth. We conduct cost-benefit analysis of hypothetical investments in human capital and infrastructure. We find that, while investment in infrastructure generates higher returns in the developed, eastern regions than in the interior, investing in human capital generates slightly higher or comparable returns in the interior regions. We conclude that human capital investment in less-developed areas is justified on efficiency grounds and because it contributes to a reduction in regional inequality.     

社会资本对收入水平及差异的影响是扩大还是减少*——来自12省份城市居民的样本

本文基于CHIP（中国家庭收入调查）（2002年）数据,实证研究了我国城市居民的社会资本对其收入水平和差异的影响。在其他条件相同的情况下,居民收入会随着自身社会资本的改善而提高。社会资本对收入差距的影响可以分解为两种不同的机制：（1）即使个体的社会资本相同,由于社会资本的收入回报率的异质性,社会资本在不同的收入群体中会产生扩大收入差距的影响;（2）给定社会资本的收入回报率相同,个体社会资本量的异质性也会扩大收入差距。笔者用分位数回归方法分析了社会资本的收入回报率在不同收入水平上的分布,从而验证了第一类机制。给定社会资本的收入回报率相同,使用夏普利值分解的方法发现,个体社会资本量的异质性会加剧收入差距的扩大,但是这一贡献并没有区域、行业特征等因素显著。随后的实证分析检验了社会资本对收入确实有提高作用,同时也分析出社会资本可能会缩小收入差距。这加深了我们对于社会资本在经济发展中微观机制的理解,并对制定消除收入差距的政策有指导意义。     

机会不平等与社会流动预期研究——基于CGSS数据的经验分析

随着"中国梦"的提出,对于居民社会流动预期的研究受到了广泛关注.现有文献对于社会流动预期影响因素的相关研究较为匮乏,文章在政府以实现社会公平正义为目标的改革背景之下,研究我国机会不平等对居民社会流动预期的影响,具有重要的理论和现实意义.研究表明:机会不平等作用于社会流动预期的总效应为正,即当前机会不平等程度越高的地区,人们向上的社会流动预期越显著;并且,这种正向影响在家庭背景条件较差、年龄较大、受教育程度较高以及非农业户籍群体中更加显著.文章认为,在政府以实现社会公平正义为目标的改革背景下,人们预期未来机会不平等程度会下降,导致机会不平等直接效应的不利影响受到间接效应的抵消,从而出现上述看似"有悖常理"的结论.实证结果也在一定程度上证实了间接效应的存在.因此,相对于当前现实存在的机会不平等,人们对未来机会不平等变化的预期对其社会流动预期的影响更为突出.政府部门应当在贯彻落实公平政策的同时,实施必要的预期管理,增强人们对政府部门的信任,使其保持对未来改革政策的乐观预期,从而维持当前较为良好的居民社会流动预期.     

Income inequality among minority farmers in China: Does social capital have a role?

We used recently available household panel data collected by China's National Bureau of Statistics to examine the effects of natural, human, material, and social capital on income inequality among minority farmers in China's Xinjiang Province between 2011 and 2012. Results obtained from panel quantile regression and correlated random effects’ models show that income inequality and the poverty of ethnic farmers have been decreasing to some extent. Results also indicated that human capital exacerbates income inequality among the minorities, whereas the effect of natural capital on income inequality is not evident. Social and material capital reduce income inequality among ethnic minorities. Results from the decomposition of the Gini coefficient indicate that material and social capital contribute to a substantial majority of the income inequality in the region.     

Current account dynamics and capital mobility in the newly industrialized countries

This paper examines the current account dynamics in a group of ten newly industrialized countries (NICs) during the period 1980–2012 using a panel error-correction model. The model is also used to empirically test whether the degree of capital mobility is positively related to financial openness. The Chin-Ito (2006, 2008) financial openness index is used to classify the countries into different groups, and we place the countries in one group that are similar to each other in terms of their financial openness. Furthermore, to evaluate the extent of capital mobility over the different period from 1980 to 2012, the total period under study is divided into three sub-periods. The estimation results indicate that there exist long-run equilibrium relationships between domestic saving, investment, and current account in all groups regardless of their degree of financial openness. We find that more openness in terms of the capital account is associated with a higher degree of capital mobility in the case of NICs. The empirical result also indicates that the degree of capital mobility is higher in the first and third sub-period.     

Sudden stops,sectoral reallocations,and the real exchange rate

A sudden stop of capital flows into a developing country tends to be followed by a rapid switch from trade deficits to surpluses, a depreciation of the real exchange rate, and decreases in output and total factor productivity. Substantial reallocation takes place from the nontraded sector to the traded sector. We construct a multisector growth model, calibrate it to the Mexican economy, and use it to analyze Mexico's 1994–95 crisis. When subjected to a sudden stop, the model accounts for the trade balance reversal and the real exchange rate depreciation, but it cannot account for the decreases in GDP and TFP. Extending the model to include labor frictions and variable capital utilization, we still find that it cannot quantitatively account for the dynamics of output and productivity without losing the ability to account for the movements of other variables.     

IDIOSYNCRATIC AND AGGREGATE RISKS,INEQUALITY AND GROWTH

The paper disaggregates productivity shocks at a firm level into idiosyncratic and aggregate risks, and studies their impacts on inequality, growth and welfare. It develops a growth model with human capital and incomplete insurance and credit markets that provides a closed‐form solution for income inequality dynamics. We find that uninsured idiosyncratic risks are the most important determinants of inequality, growth and welfare. They are the source of nondegenerate wealth distribution. A lower weight of these shocks leads to lower steady‐state inequality, higher growth and welfare. A redistribution of income that serves as social insurance against such risks increases welfare and decreases inequality. But, it also decreases growth by distorting individual consumption and saving decisions.     

Intergenerational Mobility under Private vs. Public Education*

Intergenerational earnings mobility is analyzed in a model where human capital is produced using schooling and parental time. In steady states more mobile societies have less inequality, but in the short run higher mobility may result from an increase in inequality. Starting from the same inequality, mobility is higher under public than under private education. A rise in income shocks, for example due to increased returns to ability, or a switch from public to private schooling both increase inequality. However, increased shocks raise mobility in the short run and do not affect it in the long run, whereas an increased role for private schooling reduces mobility in both the short and long run. That these differences may help to identify the source of changes in inequality, and other real‐world implications, are illustrated in a brief discussion of time trends and cross‐country differences.