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Optimal grouping of commodities for indirect taxation

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  • Belan, Pascal
  • Gauthier, Stéphane
  • Laroque, Guy

Abstract

Indirect taxes contribute to a sizeable part of government revenues around the world. Typically there are few different tax rates, and the goods are partitioned into classes associated with each rate. The present paper studies how to group the goods in these few classes. We take as given the number of tax rates and study the optimal aggregation (or classification) of commodities of the fiscal authority in a second best setup. The results are illustrated on data from the United Kingdom.

Suggested Citation

  • Belan, Pascal & Gauthier, Stéphane & Laroque, Guy, 2008. "Optimal grouping of commodities for indirect taxation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(7), pages 1738-1750, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:pubeco:v:92:y:2008:i:7:p:1738-1750
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    1. Stéphane Gauthier, 2013. "Optimal tax base with administrative fixed costs," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 20(6), pages 961-973, December.
    2. Julien Daubanes & Pierre Lasserre, 2011. "Optimum Commodity Taxation with a Non-Renewable Resource," CER-ETH Economics working paper series 11/151, CER-ETH - Center of Economic Research (CER-ETH) at ETH Zurich.
    3. Braouezec, Yann, 2016. "On the welfare effects of regulating the number of discriminatory prices," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(4), pages 588-607.
    4. Lim Jean & Rodríguez-Zamora Carolina, 2010. "The Optimal Tax Rule in the Presence of Time Use," Working Papers 2010-05, Banco de México.
    5. Christian Gillitzer & Henrik Jacobsen Kleven & Joel Slemrod, 2017. "A Characteristics Approach to Optimal Taxation: Line Drawing and Tax‐Driven Product Innovation," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 119(2), pages 240-267, April.
    6. Belan, Pascal & Gauthier, Stephane, 2006. "Optimal indirect taxation with a restricted number of tax rates," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(6-7), pages 1201-1213, August.
    7. Boadway, Robin & Cuff, Katherine, 2022. "A generalization of the Deaton-Hellwig results on uniform commodity taxation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 214(C).
    8. Robin Boadway & Katherine Cuff, 2023. "The Case for Uniform Commodity Taxation: A Tax Reform Approach," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 244(1), pages 79-109, March.
    9. Alain Babatounde & Bart Capeau & Romain Houssa, 2023. "Welfare effects of indirect tax policies in West Africa," DeFiPP Working Papers 2301, University of Namur, Development Finance and Public Policies.
    10. Robin Boadway, 2017. "Second-Best Theory: Ageing well at Sixty," Pacific Economic Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(2), pages 249-270, May.
    11. Yann Braouezec, 2013. "The Welfare Effects of Regulating the Number of Market Segments," Working Papers 2013-ECO-11, IESEG School of Management.

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