The dynamic efficiency cost of not taxing housing

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Skinner, J
• 署名单位: University of Virginia; National Bureau of Economic Research
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF PUBLIC ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0047-2727
• DOI: 10.1016/0047-2727(95)01509-4
• 发表日期: 1996
• 页码: 397-417
• 关键词: taxation; housing; efficiency cost saving

摘要

Traditional welfare cost estimates of tax subsidies for owner-occupied housing are less than 0.5% of GNP in the United States and Canada. This paper argues that these static measures understate the true cost of the tax subsidy. Increasing the capital income tax makes untaxed housing more valuable, delivering a windfall bonus to existing homeowners at the expense of future generations. This intergenerational transfer has real efficiency effects in the presence of pre-existing tax distortions. When housing is in fixed supply, the dynamic efficiency cost of preferential tax treatment for housing is as much as 2.2% of GNP, or $120 billion dollars in 1990.