Measuring tax efficiency: A tax optimality index

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Raimondos-Moller, Pascalis; Woodland, Alan D.
• 署名单位: Copenhagen Business School; University of Sydney
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF PUBLIC ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0047-2727
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2005.12.003
• 发表日期: 2006
• 页码: 1903-1922
• 关键词: tax optimality index; excess burden of taxation; tax burden; distance function

摘要

This paper introduces an index of tax optimality that measures the distance of some current tax structure from the optimal tax structure in the presence of public goods. This index is defined on the [0, 1] interval and measures the proportion of the optimal tax rates that will achieve the same welfare outcome as some arbitrarily given initial tax structure. We call this number the Tax Optimality Index. We also show how the basic methodology can be altered to derive a revenue equivalent uniform tax, which measures the tax burden implied by the public sector. A numerical example is used to illustrate the method developed, and extensions of the analysis to handle models with multiple households and nonlinear taxation structures are undertaken. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.