IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecolet/v224y2023ics0165176523000563.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

In defense of the Kaldor-Hicks criterion

Author

Listed:
  • Mukoyama, Toshihiko

Abstract

This paper argues the Kaldor-Hicks criterion can be a sensible criterion for judging the policy benefit in a dynamic economy if the agents can trade state-contingent securities regarding a future policy change. When the probability of the policy change is very small, ex-ante security trades can increase everyone’s consumption after the policy implementation when the Kaldor-Hicks criterion is met, even without an ex-post redistribution by the government.

Suggested Citation

  • Mukoyama, Toshihiko, 2023. "In defense of the Kaldor-Hicks criterion," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 224(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolet:v:224:y:2023:i:c:s0165176523000563
    DOI: 10.1016/j.econlet.2023.111031
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165176523000563
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.econlet.2023.111031?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mukoyama, Toshihiko, 2021. "MIT shocks imply market incompleteness," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).
    2. Ruediger Bachmann & Jinhui Bai & Minjoon Lee & Fudong Zhang, 2020. "The Welfare and Distributional Effects of Fiscal Volatility: a Quantitative Evaluation," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 38, pages 127-153, October.
    3. Ofer Setty & Yaniv Yedid-Levi, 2021. "On the Provision of Unemployment Insurance when Workers are Ex-Ante Heterogeneous," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(1), pages 664-706.
    4. Mukoyama, Toshihiko, 2013. "Understanding the welfare effects of unemployment insurance policy in general equilibrium," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 38(PB), pages 347-368.
    5. David Domeij & Jonathan Heathcote, 2004. "On The Distributional Effects Of Reducing Capital Taxes," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 45(2), pages 523-554, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Mukoyama, Toshihiko, 2010. "Welfare effects of unanticipated policy changes with complete asset markets," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 109(2), pages 134-138, November.
    2. Jochen Mankart & Rigas Oikonomou, 2017. "Household Search and the Aggregate Labour Market," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 84(4), pages 1735-1788.
    3. Mukoyama, Toshihiko, 2021. "MIT shocks imply market incompleteness," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).
    4. Juan-Carlos Cordoba, 2004. "Debt-Constraints or Incomplete Markets? A Decomposition of the Wealth and Consumption Inequality in the U.S," Econometric Society 2004 Latin American Meetings 335, Econometric Society.
    5. Charles Grant & Christos Koulovatianos & Alexander Michaelides & Mario Padula, 2010. "Evidence on the Insurance Effect of Redistributive Taxation," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 92(4), pages 965-973, November.
    6. Sebastian Dyrda & Marcelo Pedroni, 2015. "Optimal Fiscal Policy in a Model with Uninsurable Idiosyncratic Shocks," Working Papers tecipa-550, University of Toronto, Department of Economics.
    7. Chen, Yunmin & Chien, YiLi & Wen, Yi & Yang, C.C., 2021. "Are unconditional lump-sum transfers a good idea?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 209(C).
    8. Anagnostopoulos, Alexis & Cárceles-Poveda, Eva & Lin, Danmo, 2012. "Dividend and capital gains taxation under incomplete markets," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(7), pages 599-611.
    9. Piero Gottardi & Atsushi Kajii & Tomoyuki Nakajima, 2015. "Optimal Taxation and Debt with Uninsurable Risks to Human Capital Accumulation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(11), pages 3443-3470, November.
    10. Röhrs, Sigrid & Winter, Christoph, 2017. "Reducing government debt in the presence of inequality," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 1-20.
    11. Giulio Fella & Giovanni Gallipoli, 2014. "Education and Crime over the Life Cycle," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 81(4), pages 1484-1517.
    12. Charles Gottlieb & Maren Froemel, 2015. "General Equilibrium Effects of Targeted Transfers: The case of EITC," 2015 Meeting Papers 1264, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    13. Panousi, Vasia, 2009. "Capital Taxation with Entrepreneurial Risk," MPRA Paper 24237, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Gustavo Marrero, 2010. "Tax-mix, public spending composition and growth," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 99(1), pages 29-51, February.
    15. Gerald Carlino & Nicholas Zarra & Robert Inman & Thorsten Drautzburg, 2019. "Fiscal Policy in Monetary Unions: State Partisanship and its Macroeconomic Effects," 2019 Meeting Papers 434, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    16. Berriel, Tiago Couto & Zilberman, Eduardo, 2011. "Targeting the poor: a macroeconomic analysis of cash transfer programs," FGV EPGE Economics Working Papers (Ensaios Economicos da EPGE) 726, EPGE Brazilian School of Economics and Finance - FGV EPGE (Brazil).
    17. Marta González-Torrabadella & Josep Pijoan-Mas, 2006. "Flat tax reforms: a general equilibrium evaluation for Spain," Investigaciones Economicas, Fundación SEPI, vol. 30(2), pages 317-351, May.
    18. Sebastian Koehne & Nicola Pavoni & Arpad Abraham, 2011. "Optimal Income Taxation with Asset Accumulation," 2011 Meeting Papers 1161, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    19. Günther Rehme, 2023. "Capital depreciation allowances, redistributive taxation, and economic growth," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 25(1), pages 168-195, February.
    20. Olivier Allais & Yann Algan & Edouard Challe & Xavier Ragot, 2020. "The Welfare Cost of Inflation Risk under Imperfect Insurance," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 138, pages 1-20.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Kaldor-Hicks criterion; Cost–benefit analysis; Heterogeneous-agent macroeconomics; Redistribution;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D61 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Allocative Efficiency; Cost-Benefit Analysis
    • E60 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - General
    • H23 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Externalities; Redistributive Effects; Environmental Taxes and Subsidies

    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:eee:ecolet:v:224:y:2023:i:c:s0165176523000563. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/ecolet .

    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.