This paper investigates the importance of political ideology and opportunism in the choice of the tax structure. In particular, we examine the effects of cabinet ideology and elections on the distribution of the tax burden across factors of production and consumption for 21 OECD countries over the period 1970-2000 by employing four alternative cabinet ideology measures and by using the methodol...

In the 1990s, many states liberalized statutory rules regarding the tax treatment of earned and unearned income for welfare program eligibility and benefit levels. I use quality control data from the AFDC/TANF program over 1983–2002 to document changes in the corresponding effective tax rates and benefit guarantees. After welfare reform I find that effective tax rates fell by 50 percent on earn...

We develop an optimal tax timing model that takes into account asymmetric long-term and shortterm tax rates for positive capital gains and limited tax deductibility of capital losses. In contrast to the existing literature, this model can help explain why many investors not only defer shortterm capital losses to long term but also defer large long-term capital gains and losses. Because the bene...

We develop an optimal tax timing model that takes into account asymmetric long-term and shortterm tax rates for positive capital gains and limited tax deductibility of capital losses. In contrast to the existing literature, this model can help explain why many investors not only defer shortterm capital losses to long term but also defer large long-term capital gains and losses. Because the bene...

This paper investigates the effect of horizontal corporate group (keiretsu) affiliation on effective tax rates in Japan. After controlling for variables that affect corporate income taxes, keiretsu firms have lower effective tax rates than independent firms. These findings are attributed to political power and the unique corporate governance mechanism of keiretsu groups. Furthermore, horizontal...