EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: In recent years a number of papers have been published validating the positive impact of parks on property values. Th is paper follows the early precedent established by Olmsted in extending the analysis to calculate the tax revenues that accrue to a community from these value increments and relating them to the cost of the land acquisition. Th e analysis was undertaken on th...

We estimate the elasticity of corporate taxable income with respect to the effective corporate tax rate on the basis of a pseudo-panel constructed from corporate tax return micro data for the period 1998-2001, a period which saw the introduction of a major corporate tax reform in Germany. Endogeneity of the effective tax rate is controlled for by an instrumental variable approach. Our instrumen...

This paper examines equilibrium determination under different monetary policy regimes when the government might default on its debt. We apply a cash-inadvance model where the government does not have access to non-distortionary taxation and does not account for initial outstanding debt when it sets the income tax rate. Solvency is then not guaranteed and sovereign default can affect the return ...

The first study for this dissertation develops a tax-adjusted cost-of-carry model for Australian stock index futures and estimates the value of the debt tax shield, cash dividends and imputation tax credits flowing from the basket stocks in the index. As discussed in the previous chapter, the study relaxes the assumption made in previous research that interest and dividends receive the same tax...

Miller (1977) emphasized that optimal corporate financial policy depends on the tax rates facing the firm as well as the tax treatment accorded bondand stock-holders. In equilibrium, firms will issue claims that are held by the full spectrum of investors, from tax-exempt institutional investors to heavily taxed individuals. However, dealers are tax neutral institutions that can buy corporate se...

What determines the sustainability of sovereign debt? In this paper, we develop a model where myopic governments seek electoral popularity but can nevertheless commit credibly to service external debt. They do not default when they are poor even though default costs are low because they would lose access to debt markets and be forced to reduce spending; they do not default when they become rich...

This paper develops and analyzes a dynamic model of leverage, taking account of tax deductibility of interest payments and the endogenous expected cost of default. The interest rate on debt includes a premium to compensate lenders for expected losses in default. Lenders are unwilling to lend an amount that would trigger immediate default, which places a borrowing constraint on the firm. When th...

This paper investigates the effect of managerial flexibility on the choice of capital structure for a firm and the corresponding valuation of its long term debt. We consider a general model in continuous time where the manager (who is not a shareholder) of a firm with long term debt in place may dynamically switch strategies at random times so as to maximize his expected discounted compensation...

We describe a simple mechanism that generates inflation persistence in a standard sticky-price model of optimal fiscal and monetary policy. Key to this mechanism is that policies are implemented under discretion. The government’s discretionary incentive to erode the real value of nominal public debt by means of surprise inflation renders inflation expectations and, in further consequence, equil...

What determines the sustainability of sovereign debt? In this paper, we develop a model where myopic governments seek electoral popularity but can nevertheless commit credibly to service external debt. They do not default when they are poor even though default costs are low because they would lose access to debt markets and be forced to reduce spending; they do not default when they become rich...