We assess the effects of U.S. tax policy reforms on inequality by applying a new decomposition method that allows us to disentangle the direct policy effect from the effect of changing market incomes. Over the whole period 1979-2007 the cumulative tax policy effect aggravated income inequality...

The German tax system is usually considered as one of the most progressive ones in Europe, especially due to its unique mathematical formula of continuously increasing marginal tax rates in the personal income tax. However, other taxes such as indirect or payroll taxes need to be considered as...

The current debt crisis has given rise to a debate about deeper fiscal integration in Europe. The view is widespread that moving towards a ‘fiscal union’ would have a stabilising effect in the event of macroeconomic shocks. In this paper we study the economic effects of introducing...

We follow the inverted optimal tax approach to characterize and compare "tax-benefit revealed" social preferences in 17 EU countries and the US. Following Bargain et al. (2013), we invert the optimal income taxation model on the distributions of net and gross incomes and use labor supply...

We assess the effects of U.S. tax policy reforms on inequality by applying a new decomposition method that allows us to disentangle the direct policy effect from the effect of changing market incomes. Over the whole period 1979-2007 the cumulative tax policy effect aggravated income inequality...

Germany continues to play a pioneering role in replacing conventional power plants with renewable energy sources. While this might be beneficial with respect to environmental quality, it also implies increasing electricity prices. The extent to which this is associated with negative impacts on...

Basierend auf einem Projekt im Auftrag der Bertelsmann Stiftung, Bonn 2012 (78 Seiten)

When assessing the effects of policy reforms on the labor market, most studies only focus on labor supply. The interaction of supply and demand is not explicitly modeled, which might lead to biased estimates of potential labor market outcomes. This paper proposes a straightforward method to...

It is widely believed that globalization affects the extent of employment and wage responses to economic shocks. To provide evidence for this, we analyze the effect of firms’ exporting behavior on the elasticity of labor demand. Using rich, German administrative linked employer-employee panel...

Deutschland wird im europäischen Vergleich häufig ein überdurchschnittlich progressives Steuersystem attestiert. Die einzigartige, mehrstufige Progressionsformel der Einkommensteuer trägt ohne Zweifel zu dieser Sichtweise bei. Um ein umfassendes Bild der Progressivität eines Gesamtsystems...