Using the German local business tax as a testing ground, we empirically investigate the impact of firm agglomeration on municipal tax setting behavior. The analysis exploits a rich data source on the population of German firms to construct detailed measures for the communities' agglomeration...

This paper assesses the agglomeration pattern of four-digit industries in Germany using a rich data set on the population of German firms. To identify geographical agglomeration, we follow the distance based approach of Duranton and Overman (2005) and find that the location pattern of 78% of our...

This paper shows that subsidy competition may be efficiency enhancing. We model a subsidy game among two asymmetric regions in a new trade model, where capital can freely move among regions, but capital rewards are repatriated. We study subsidy competition, starting from an equilibrium where the...

This paper analyzes competition for capital between welfare-maximizing gov- ernments in a framework with agglomeration tendencies and asymmetric union- ization. We find that a unionized country's government finds it optimal to use tax policy to induce industry to relocate towards a location with...

This paper shows that subsidy competition may be efficiency enhancing. We model a subsidy game among two asymmetric regions in a new trade model, where capital can freely move among regions, but capital rewards are repatriated. We study subsidy competition, starting from an equilibrium where the...

Living costs in Germany have surged since Russia's attack on Ukraine. In this article, we discuss pros and cons of different government policies to protect affected citizens. There is a vast domain of possible relief options, each coming with its own trade-offs and design pitfalls. Information...

Maximilian Blömer, Florian Dorn und Clemens Fuest, ifo Institut, untersuchen die Aufkommens- und Verteilungswirkungen der kalten Progression und der steuerpolitischen Tarifanpassungen der Jahre 2022 und 2023. Sie zeigen, dass die Maßnahmen zwar die Steuerzahler*innen im Vergleich zum...

Over the past decade, several countries augmented their national tax law by transfer pricing legislations in order to limit opportunities for tax-motivated transfer price distortions and the associated relocation of multnational income from their borders. The aim of this paper is to empirically...

This paper examines the impact of tax incentives on corporate research and development (R&D) activity. Traditionally, R&D tax incentives have been provided in the form of special tax allowances and tax credits. In recent years, several countries moreover reduced their income tax rates on R&D...