IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ntj/journl/v53y2000i2p215-28.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Importance of Measurement Error in the Cost of Capital

Author

Listed:
  • Goolsbee, Austan

Abstract

Conventional estimates of the impact of taxes on investment may be seriously biased by measurement error in the cost of capital. The existence and size of such error, however, has not been documented. Using panel data on different types of capital equipment, this paper provides direct evidence of measurement error in the tax component of the cost of capital accounting for about 20 percent of the tax term's variance. Correcting for the error with instrumental variables (IV) estimation shows that taxes significantly affect both prices and investment and that conventional results may be off by as much as a factor of four.

Suggested Citation

  • Goolsbee, Austan, 2000. "The Importance of Measurement Error in the Cost of Capital," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 53(2), pages 215-228, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:ntj:journl:v:53:y:2000:i:2:p:215-28
    DOI: 10.17310/ntj.2000.2.03
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.17310/ntj.2000.2.03
    Download Restriction: Access is restricted to subscribers and members of the National Tax Association.
    File URL: https://doi.org/10.17310/ntj.2000.2.03
    Download Restriction: Access is restricted to subscribers and members of the National Tax Association.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.17310/ntj.2000.2.03?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. Robert S. Chirinko, 1992. "Business Fixed Investment Spending: A Critical survey of Modeling Strategies, Empirical Results, and Policy Implications," Working Papers 9213, Harris School of Public Policy Studies, University of Chicago.
    2. Auerbach, Alan J & Hines, James R, Jr, 1988. "Investment Tax Incentives and Frequent Tax Reforms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 78(2), pages 211-216, May.
    3. Lee, Chung H., 1996. "Financial deregulation and integration in East Asia : edited by Takatoshi Ito and Anne O. Krueger, NBER-East Asia Seminar on Economics VoL 5, Chicago and London: National Bureau of Economic Research a," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 7(4), pages 785-787.
    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. Stéphane Guimbert, 2002. "Réformes de la fiscalité du capital en Europe," Revue Française d'Économie, Programme National Persée, vol. 16(4), pages 113-169.
    2. Martin Simmler, 2014. "Do multinational firms invest more? On the impact of internal debt financing on capital accumulation," Working Papers 1424, Oxford University Centre for Business Taxation.
    3. Goolsbee, Austan, 2004. "Taxes and the quality of capital," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(3-4), pages 519-543, March.
    4. Ramirez Verdugo, Arturo, 2005. "Tax Incentives and Business Investment: New Evidence from Mexico," MPRA Paper 2272, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 04 Oct 2006.
    5. Guceri, Irem & Albinowski, Maciej, 2021. "Investment responses to tax policy under uncertainty," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 141(3), pages 1147-1170.
    6. Fatica, Serena, 2018. "Business capital accumulation and the user cost: Is there a heterogeneity bias?," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 15-34.
    7. Yoonsoo Lee, 2005. "The importance of reallocations in cyclical productivity and returns to scale: evidence from plant-level data," Working Papers (Old Series) 0509, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    8. Schaller, Huntley & Voia, Marcel, 2017. "Panel cointegration estimates of the user cost elasticity," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 235-250.
    9. Mr. Shaun K. Roache, 2006. "Domestic Investment and the Cost of Capital in the Caribbean," IMF Working Papers 2006/152, International Monetary Fund.
    10. Laura Spierdijk, 2023. "Assessing the consistency of the fixed-effects estimator: a regression-based Wald test," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 64(4), pages 1599-1630, April.
    11. Nadja Dwenger, 2014. "User Cost Elasticity of Capital Revisited," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 81(321), pages 161-186, January.
    12. Walch, Florian & Dwenger, Nadja, 2011. "Tax Losses and Firm Investment: Evidence from Tax Statistics," VfS Annual Conference 2011 (Frankfurt, Main): The Order of the World Economy - Lessons from the Crisis 48699, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    13. Shaun K. Roache, 2006. "Domestic Investment and the Cost of Capital in the Caribbean," Applied Econometrics and International Development, Euro-American Association of Economic Development, vol. 6(3).

    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. Goolsbee, Austan, 2000. "The Importance of Measurement Error in the Cost of Capital," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association, vol. 53(n. 2), pages 215-28, June.
    2. Timothy Erickson & Toni M. Whited, 2000. "Measurement Error and the Relationship between Investment and q," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 108(5), pages 1027-1057, October.
    3. Balázs Égert, 2018. "Regulation, Institutions and Aggregate Investment: New Evidence from OECD Countries," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 29(2), pages 415-449, April.
    4. Oleksandr Shcherbakov, 2022. "Firm‐level investment under imperfect capital markets in Ukraine," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(1), pages 227-255, February.
    5. Karl Whelan, 2002. "Some New Economy Lessons for Macroeconomists," Recherches économiques de Louvain, De Boeck Université, vol. 68(1), pages 21-36.
    6. Kiley, Michael T., 2001. "Computers and growth with frictions: aggregate and disaggregate evidence," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 171-215, December.
    7. Giuseppe Cinquegrana, 2014. "Effetti differenziali delle politiche monetarie sugli investimenti delle imprese industriali italiane: un?analisi con metodologia panel," RIVISTA DI ECONOMIA E STATISTICA DEL TERRITORIO, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2014(3), pages 40-78.
    8. Bergman, Mats A. & Johansson, Per & Bergman, M.A., 2002. "Large investments in the pulp and paper industry: a count data regression analysis," Journal of Forest Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(1), pages 29-52.
    9. Verikios, George, 2020. "The dynamic effects of infectious disease outbreaks: the case of pandemic influenza and human coronavirus," MPRA Paper 104434, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Mihir A. Desai & James R. Hines, Jr., 1999. "Excess Capital Flows and the Burden of Inflation in Open Economies," NBER Chapters, in: The Costs and Benefits of Price Stability, pages 235-272, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Matteo Iacoviello & Fabio Schiantarelli & Scott Schuh, 2011. "Input And Output Inventories In General Equilibrium," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 52(4), pages 1179-1213, November.
    12. Schneider, Georg & Sureth, Caren, 2010. "The impact of profit taxation on capitalized investment with options to delay and divest," arqus Discussion Papers in Quantitative Tax Research 97, arqus - Arbeitskreis Quantitative Steuerlehre.
    13. Shimano, Norihito, 2017. "The effect of pro-shareholder income distribution on capital accumulation: evidence from Japanese non-financial firms," MPRA Paper 76830, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Denny IRAWAN & OKIMOTO Tatsuyoshi, 2021. "How Do ESG Performance and Awareness Affect Firm Value and Corporate Overinvestment?," Discussion papers 21033, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    15. Daron Acemoglu & James A. Robinson, 2015. "The Rise and Decline of General Laws of Capitalism," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 29(1), pages 3-28, Winter.
    16. Tevlin, Stacey & Whelan, Karl, 2003. "Explaining the Investment Boom of the 1990s," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 35(1), pages 1-22, February.
    17. Loïc Levi & Laure Latruffe & Aude Ridier, 2019. "Farm performance and investment decisions: evidence from the French (Brittany) dairy sector," Working Papers SMART 19-01, INRAE UMR SMART.
    18. Jean-Bernard Chatelain, 2002. "Structural modelling of investment and financial constraints: Where do we stand?," Working Paper Research 28, National Bank of Belgium.
    19. Henriques, Irene & Sadorsky, Perry, 2011. "The effect of oil price volatility on strategic investment," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 79-87, January.
    20. Jason G. Cummins, 2000. "Taxation and the Sources of Growth: Estimates from U.S. Multinational Corporations," NBER Chapters, in: International Taxation and Multinational Activity, pages 231-264, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    More about this item

    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:ntj:journl:v:53:y:2000:i:2:p:215-28. 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: The University of Chicago Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.ntanet.org/ .

    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.