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Optimal Tax Progressivity in Unionised Labour Markets: What are the Driving Forces?

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  • Stefan BOETERS

Abstract

In labour markets with collective wage bargaining, progressivity of the labour income tax creates a trade-off that allows the degree of progressivity to be determined optimally. On the one hand, wages are lowered and unemployment decreases, on the other hand, the individual labour supply decision is distorted at the hours-of-work margin. The optimal level of tax progressivity within this trade-off is determined using a numerical general equilibrium model with imperfect competition on the goods market, collective wage bargaining and a labour-supply module calibrated to empirically plausible elasticity values. The model is calibrated to macroeconomic and institutional parameters of both the OECD average and a number of individual OECD countries. In most cases the optimal degree of tax progressivity is below the actual level. A decomposition approach shows that the optimal level is increased by high unemployment and by the general tax level.
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  • Stefan BOETERS, 2008. "Optimal Tax Progressivity in Unionised Labour Markets: What are the Driving Forces?," EcoMod2008 23800014, EcoMod.
    • Handle: RePEc:ekd:000238:23800014
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Stefan Boeters & Luc Savard, 2011. "The Labour Market in CGE Models," Cahiers de recherche 11-20, Departement d'économique de l'École de gestion à l'Université de Sherbrooke.
    2. Stefan Boeters, 2013. "Optimal Tax Progressivity in Unionised Labour Markets: Simulation Results for Germany," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 41(4), pages 447-474, April.
    3. Chun‐Chieh Huang & Juin‐Jen Chang & Hsiao‐Wen Hung, 2020. "Progressive Tax and Inequality in a Unionized Economy," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 122(1), pages 38-80, January.
    4. Boeters, Stefan & Savard, Luc, 2013. "The Labor Market in Computable General Equilibrium Models," Handbook of Computable General Equilibrium Modeling, in: Peter B. Dixon & Dale Jorgenson (ed.), Handbook of Computable General Equilibrium Modeling, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 0, pages 1645-1718, Elsevier.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • H21 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Efficiency; Optimal Taxation
    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply
    • J51 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - Trade Unions: Objectives, Structure, and Effects
    • J64 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Unemployment: Models, Duration, Incidence, and Job Search

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