This study combines the 2013 Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances data and the Fiscal Analyzer, a highly detailed life-cycle consumption-smoothing program, to a) measure ultimate economic inequality – inequality in lifetime spending power – within cohorts, b) assess fiscal...

This study combines the 2013 Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances data and the Fiscal Analyzer, a highly detailed life-cycle consumption-smoothing program, to a) measure ultimate economic inequality - inequality in lifetime spending power - within cohorts, b) assess fiscal progressivity...

[...]With fiscal affairs apparently in order—at least in the shortrun—and with some perspective on the past twenty-five years’economic performance, we are in a position to ask how well thebudget process has worked to produce a coherent andresponsive fiscal policy, particularly given the...