Taxation of capital gains at realization may distort individuals' decisions regarding holding or selling during an asset's lifetime. This creates the problem of designing a tax structure for capital gains so as to induce efficient patterns of holding and selling. Several tax structures are...

This paper is concerned with tax policies designed to obtain an improved competitive allocation in the presence of consumption externalities. It is known that the full optimum can, in general, be attained only through the imposition of excise taxes at different levels for different individuals....

Our tax system was designed for an economy with little or no inflation. The current paper shows that inflation causes capricious changes in the effective rate of tax on capital income and therefore in the real net rate of return that savers receive. This is not only a temporary disequilibrium...

How much credit can be given to entrepreneurship for the unprecedented innovation and growth of free-enterprise economies? In this book, some of the world's leading economists tackle this difficult and understudied question, and their responses shed new light on how free-market economies...

When individuals choose from whatever alternatives available to them the one that maximizes their utility then it is always desirable that the government provide them with as many alternatives as possible. Individuals, however, do not always choose what is best for them and their mistakes may be...

When information on longevity (survival functions) is unknown early in life, individuals have an interest to insure themselves against future "risk-class" classification. Accordingly, the First-Best typically involves transfers across states of nature. Competitive equilibrium cannot provide such...

With varying aptitudes in different occupations, individuals typically maximize income by specializing in one occupation which promises the highest income. Due to numerous labor market imperfections and uncertainties, the choice of best occupation is accomplished with only partial success. We...

In a perfectly competitive market for annuities with full information, the price of annuities is equal to individuals (discounted) survival probabilities. That is, prices are actuarially fair. In contrast, the pricing implicit in social security systems invariably allows for cross subsidization...