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Household bargaining and the design of couples’ income taxation

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  • Cremer, Helmuth
  • Lozachmeur, Jean-Marie
  • Maldonado, Dario
  • Roeder, Kerstin

Abstract

This paper studies the design of couples’ income taxation when consumption and labor supply decisions within the couple are made by maximizing a weighted sum of the spouses’ utilities; bargaining weights are given but specific to each couple. Information structure and labor supply decisions follow the Mirrleesian tradition. However, while the household's total consumption is publicly observable, the consumption levels of the individual spouses are not observable. With a utilitarian social welfare function we show that the expression for a spouses’ marginal income tax rate includes a “Pigouvian” (paternalistic) and an incentive term. The Pigouvian term favors a marginal subsidy (tax) for the high-weight (low-weight) spouse, whose labor supply otherwise tends to be too low (high). The sign and the magnitude of the incentive term depends on the weight structure across couples. In some cases both terms have the same sign and imply a positive marginal tax for the low-weight spouse (who may be female) and a negative one for the high-weight spouse (possibly the male). This is at odds with the traditional Boskin and Sheshinski results. Our conclusions can easily be generalized to more egalitarian welfare functions. Finally, we present numerical simulations based on a calibrated specification of our model. The calculations confirm that the male spouse may well have the lower (and possibly even negative) marginal tax rate.

Suggested Citation

  • Cremer, Helmuth & Lozachmeur, Jean-Marie & Maldonado, Dario & Roeder, Kerstin, 2016. "Household bargaining and the design of couples’ income taxation," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 454-470.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:eecrev:v:89:y:2016:i:c:p:454-470
    DOI: 10.1016/j.euroecorev.2016.09.006
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    Cited by:

    1. Patricia Apps & Ray Rees, 2018. "Optimal family taxation and income inequality," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 25(5), pages 1093-1128, October.
    2. Barigozzi, Francesca & Cremer, Helmuth & Roeder, Kerstin, 2019. "Till taxes do us part: Tax penalties or bonuses and the marriage decision," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 37-50.
    3. Takuya Obara & Yoshitomo Ogawa, 2024. "Optimal taxation in an endogenous fertility model with non-cooperative behavior," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 22(1), pages 173-197, March.
    4. Cremer, Helmuth & Barigozzi, Francesca & Roeder, Kerstin, 2017. "Until taxes do us part: tax penalties or bonuses and the marriage decision," CEPR Discussion Papers 12396, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Helmuth Cremer & Jean-Marie Lozachmeur & Kerstin Roeder, 2021. "Household bargaining, spouses’ consumption patterns and the design of commodity taxes," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 73(1), pages 225-247.
    6. van der Ploeg, Frederick & Rezai, Armon & Tovar Reanos, Miguel, 2022. "Gathering support for green tax reform: Evidence from German household surveys," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 141(C).
    7. Cremer, Helmuth & Roeder, Kerstin, 2019. "Income taxation of couples, spouses’ labor supplies and the gender wage gap," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 71-75.
    8. Reaños, Miguel Tovar & De Bruin, Kelly & Meier, David & Yakut, Aykut Mert, 2022. "Economic and Distributional Impacts of turning the Value-Added Tax into a Carbon Tax," Papers WP739, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    9. Takuya Obara & Yoshitomo Ogawa, 2020. "Optimal Taxation in an Endogenous Fertility Model with Non-Cooperative Couples," Discussion Paper Series 211, School of Economics, Kwansei Gakuin University, revised Jan 2021.
    10. Komura, Mizuki & Ogawa, Hikaru & Ogawa, Yoshitomo, 2019. "Optimal income taxation when couples have endogenous bargaining power," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 384-393.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Couples’ income taxation; Household bargaining; Optimal income taxation; Household labor supply;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H21 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Efficiency; Optimal Taxation
    • H31 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - Household
    • D10 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - General

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