Income taxes, property values, and migration

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Glazer, Amihai; Kanniainen, Vesa; Poutvaara, Panu
• 署名单位: University of Helsinki; University of California System; University of California Irvine; Copenhagen Business School
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF PUBLIC ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0047-2727
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2007.07.004
• 发表日期: 2008
• 页码: 915-923
• 关键词: Taxes; land rents; Property values; migration; redistribution

摘要

We consider the effects of income redistribution when people can migrate from one country to another, and when land within each country is heterogeneous. Taxes related to income can then affect property values, and can induce migration, which further affects property values. We show that under these conditions a utilitarian government should never equalize after-tax incomes. If migration is impossible, it may even transfer income from the poor to the rich, reducing the rents earned by absentee landlords. The redistributive tax on the rich may be higher or lower when the rich can migrate than when they cannot. A Rawlsian government in the absence of mobility will equalize after-tax incomes. Under mobility, Rawlsian governments cut their taxes if and only if the relative pre-tax income of the poor is sufficiently low. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.