A fundamental element of the debate over Social Security reform is which set of principles should describe the role of the program over the next century. One possibility, which we refer to as "collectivist principles," emphasizes the economic efficiency gains that flow from a social insurance...

Recent theoretical models have called into question whether the tax exemption on the interest on municipal bonds actually provides a marginal subsidy to state and local capital investment. This paper develops a framework for testing for the presence of a subsidy and uses a state level data set...

Discusses the nature and analysis of lifetime tax incidence, and compares and contrasts this lifetime perspective with the more familiar annual perspective.

Uses a general equilibrium model capable of second-best analysis to investigate the net effects on efficiency of each of these changes in capital income taxation. Emphasizes that recent tax policy decisions were influenced by revenue considerations, distributional effects, and noneconomic...