IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/btx/wpaper/0919.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Taxing Risky Investment

Author

Listed:
  • Michael P. Devereux

    (Centre for Business Taxation, Said Business School, University of Oxford)

Abstract

This paper re-examines the impact of consumption and capital income taxes on (a) the incentive to undertake risky investment and (b) the revenue generated from such taxes. It challenges a well-known claim in the literature that a capital income tax with full loss offset can leave incentives to invest "basically unaffected" because the tax liability is offset by a reduction in the post-tax risk of the investment. Instead, it argues that such a tax would have a significantly negative impact on the incentive to invest.

Suggested Citation

  • Michael P. Devereux, 2009. "Taxing Risky Investment," Working Papers 0919, Oxford University Centre for Business Taxation.
    • Handle: RePEc:btx:wpaper:0919
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sbs.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/Business_Taxation/Docs/Publications/Working_Papers/Series_09/WP0919.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Boadway, Robin & Bruce, Neil, 1984. "A general proposition on the design of a neutral business tax," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(2), pages 231-239, July.
    2. Hubbard, R Glenn, 1997. "How Different Are Income and Consumption Taxes?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(2), pages 138-142, May.
    3. Gordon, Roger H & Wilson, John Douglas, 1989. "Measuring the Efficiency Cost of Taxing Risky Capital Income," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(3), pages 427-439, June.
    4. J. E. Stiglitz, 1969. "The Effects of Income, Wealth, and Capital Gains Taxation on Risk-Taking," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 83(2), pages 263-283.
    5. Evsey D. Domar & Richard A. Musgrave, 1944. "Proportional Income Taxation and Risk-Taking," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 58(3), pages 388-422.
    6. Bond, Stephen R. & Devereux, Michael P., 2003. "Generalised R-based and S-based taxes under uncertainty," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(5-6), pages 1291-1311, May.
    7. Bulow, Jeremy I & Summers, Lawrence H, 1984. "The Taxation of Risky Assets," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 92(1), pages 20-39, February.
    8. Bonds, Stephen R. & Devereux, Michael P., 1995. "On the design of a neutral business tax under uncertainty," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(1), pages 57-71, September.
    9. Kaplow, Louis, 1994. "Taxation and Risk Taking: A General Equilibrium Perspective," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association, vol. 47(4), pages 789-98, December.
    10. Roger H. Gordon, 1985. "Taxation of Corporate Capital Income: Tax Revenues Versus Tax Distortions," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 100(1), pages 1-27.
    11. Diderik Lund, 2002. "Taxation, Uncertainty, and the Cost of Equity," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 9(4), pages 483-503, August.
    12. Kaplow, Louis, 1994. "Taxation and Risk Taking: A General Equilibrium Perspective," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 47(4), pages 789-798, December.
    13. Louis Kaplow, 1991. "Taxation and Risk Taking: A General Equilibrium Perspective," NBER Working Papers 3709, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Fane, G., 1987. "Neutral taxation under uncertainty," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 95-105, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Michael P. Devereux, 2003. "Measuring Taxes on Income from Capital," CESifo Working Paper Series 962, CESifo.
    2. Panteghini, Paolo M., 2006. "S-based taxation under default risk," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(10-11), pages 1923-1937, November.
    3. Ruud Mooij & Michael Devereux, 2011. "An applied analysis of ACE and CBIT reforms in the EU," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 18(1), pages 93-120, February.
    4. Boar, Corina & Knowles, Matthew, 2022. "Optimal Taxation of Risky Entrepreneurial Capital," CEPR Discussion Papers 17266, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Corina Boar & Matthew Knowles, 2020. "Entrepreneurship, Agency Frictions and Redistributive Capital Taxation," Discussion Paper Series, School of Economics and Finance 202004, School of Economics and Finance, University of St Andrews.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Francesco Menoncin & Paolo M. Panteghini, 2013. "The Johansson-Samuelson Theorem in General Equilibrium: A Rebuttal," FinanzArchiv: Public Finance Analysis, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 69(1), pages 57-71, March.
    2. Alan J. Auerbach, 2006. "The Choice Between Income and Consumption Taxes: A Primer," NBER Working Papers 12307, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Dirk Schindler, 2008. "Taxing Risky Capital Income - A Commodity Taxation Approach," FinanzArchiv: Public Finance Analysis, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 64(3), pages 311-333, September.
    4. Paolo M. Panteghini, 2005. "Asymmetric Taxation under Incremental and Sequential Investment," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 7(5), pages 761-779, December.
    5. Alan J. Auerbach, 2006. "Who Bears the Corporate Tax? A Review of What We Know," NBER Chapters, in: Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 20, pages 1-40, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Sialm, Clemens, 2006. "Stochastic taxation and asset pricing in dynamic general equilibrium," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 511-540, March.
    7. Poterba, James M., 2002. "Taxation, risk-taking, and household portfolio behavior," Handbook of Public Economics, in: A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), Handbook of Public Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 17, pages 1109-1171, Elsevier.
    8. Syed M. Ahsan & Panagiotis Tsigaris, 2003. "Choice of Tax Base Revisited: Cash Flow vs. Prepayment Approaches to Consumption Taxation," CESifo Working Paper Series 983, CESifo.
    9. Syed M. Ahsan & Panagiotis Tsigaris, 2009. "The Efficiency Loss of Capital Income Taxation under Imperfect Loss Offset Provisions," Public Finance Review, , vol. 37(6), pages 710-731, November.
    10. Magnus Henrekson & Tino Sanandaji, 2011. "Entrepreneurship and the theory of taxation," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 37(2), pages 167-185, September.
    11. Konrad, Kai A., 1989. "Kapitaleinkommensteuern und beschleunigte Abschreibungen bei Unsicherheit," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 47(3), pages 404-427.
    12. Robin Boadway & Kevin Spiritus, 2021. "Optimal Taxation of Normal and Excess Returns to Risky Assets," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 21-025/VI, Tinbergen Institute.
    13. Lund, Diderik, 2009. "Marginal versus Average Beta of Equity under Corporate Taxation," Memorandum 12/2009, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    14. Katharina Finke & Jost H. Heckemeyer & Timo Reister & Christoph Spengel, 2013. "Impact of Tax-Rate Cut cum Base-Broadening Reforms on Heterogeneous Firms: Learning from the German Tax Reform of 2008," FinanzArchiv: Public Finance Analysis, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 69(1), pages 72-114, March.
    15. Schindler, Dirk, 2003. "Optimal Income Taxation with a Risky Asset: The Triple Income Tax," CoFE Discussion Papers 03/11, University of Konstanz, Center of Finance and Econometrics (CoFE).
    16. Syed Ahsan & Peter Tsigaris, 1998. "The design of a consumption tax under capital risk," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 68(1), pages 53-78, February.
    17. Peter Birch Sørensen, 2003. "Neutral Taxation of Shareholder Income: A Norwegian Tax Reform Proposal," CESifo Working Paper Series 1036, CESifo.
    18. Lund, Diderik, 2005. "An analytical model of required returns to equity under taxation with imperfect loss offset," Memorandum 13/2005, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    19. Hlouskova, Jaroslava & Tsigaris, Panagiotis, 2020. "Capital income taxation under full loss offset provisions of a prospect theory investor," IHS Working Paper Series 11, Institute for Advanced Studies.
    20. Sims, Theodore S., 2015. "Income taxation, wealth effects, and uncertainty: Portfolio adjustments with isoelastic utility and discrete probability," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 52-54.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • H25 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Business Taxes and Subsidies
    • H32 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - Firm
    • E22 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Investment; Capital; Intangible Capital; Capacity

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:btx:wpaper:0919. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Dongxian Guo (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sbsoxuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.