An often overlooked role of conscription is as a method of lump sum taxation in times of war. Conscription of military personnel allows the fiscal authority to minimize wartime government expenditure, and hence, minimize tax distortions associated with war finance. This paper presents a simple dynamic general equilibrium model to articulate this view, and calibrates the model to the U.S. World War II experience. Analysis of the calibrated model indicates that the welfare value of conscription as a fiscal policy tool is quantitatively large: despite the fact that the American involvement lasted only four years, conscription is worth approximately 2% of annual aggregate consumption in perpetuity.
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Volume (Year): 55 (2008) Issue (Month): 6 (September) Pages: 1094-1112 Download reference. The following formats are available: HTML
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References listed on IDEAS Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
Casey Mulligan & Andrei Shleifer, 2004.
"Conscription as Regulation,"
NBER Working Papers
10558, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
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R. Anton Braun & Ellen R. McGrattan, 1993.
"The Macroeconomics of War and Peace,"
NBER Chapters,
in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1993, Volume 8, pages 197-258
National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
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