IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/pubfin/v51y2023i5p649-668.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Understanding Forecasting Errors in State Personal Income Tax Revenues: The Role of Capital Gains

Author

Listed:
  • Asa Ferguson
  • Liam Marshall
  • Jonathan C. Rork

Abstract

Many states face challenges in producing accurate forecasts of tax revenue from personal income. Using data from 1996 to 2019, we look at how growth in the various base components of personal income influence the accuracy of a state's forecast of revenue from personal income taxation. We consistently find growth in capital gains, which has the highest year-to-year volatility among personal income components, to be associated with a state underestimating its actual revenues from personal income by at least 2 percentage points.

Suggested Citation

  • Asa Ferguson & Liam Marshall & Jonathan C. Rork, 2023. "Understanding Forecasting Errors in State Personal Income Tax Revenues: The Role of Capital Gains," Public Finance Review, , vol. 51(5), pages 649-668, September.
  • Handle: RePEc:sae:pubfin:v:51:y:2023:i:5:p:649-668
    DOI: 10.1177/10911421231168724
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/10911421231168724
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/10911421231168724?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Estelle P. Dauchy & Christopher Balding, 2013. "Federal Income Tax Revenue Volatility Since 1966," Working Papers w0198, New Economic School (NES).
    2. Dye, Richard F. & McGuire, Therese J., 1991. "Growth and Variability of State Individual Income and General Sales Taxes," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 44(1), pages 55-66, March.
    3. William R. Voorhees, 2006. "Consistent underestimation bias, the asymmetrical loss function, and homogeneous sources of bias in state revenue forecasts," Journal of Public Budgeting, Accounting & Financial Management, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 18(1), pages 61-76, March.
    4. Estelle P. Dauchy & Christopher Balding, 2013. "Federal Income Tax Revenue Volatility Since 1966," Working Papers w0198, Center for Economic and Financial Research (CEFIR).
    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. Marina Malkina & Rodion Balakin, 2020. "Risks of Regional Tax Systems and Their Portfolio Decomposition: The Case of Modern Russia," Acta Universitatis Agriculturae et Silviculturae Mendelianae Brunensis, Mendel University Press, vol. 68(6), pages 995-1009.
    2. Wei Han, 2020. "The analysis on Chinese e-commerce tax losses based on the perspective of information asymmetry," Electronic Commerce Research, Springer, vol. 20(3), pages 651-677, September.
    3. Igor Goncharov & Martin Jacob, 2014. "Why Do Countries Mandate Accrual Accounting for Tax Purposes?," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(5), pages 1127-1163, December.
    4. Sunjoo Kwak & Jongmin Shon, 2022. "Tax Salience and Cyclical Asymmetry in Tax Rate Adjustments: Testing the Indirect Tax Hypothesis," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 240(1), pages 3-29, March.
    5. Alison Felix, 2008. "The growth and volatility of state tax revenue sources in the Tenth District," Economic Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, vol. 93(Q III), pages 63-88.
    6. John Creedy & José Félix Sanz?Sanz, 2010. "Modelling Personal Income Taxation in Spain:Revenue Elasticities and Regional Comparisons," Department of Economics - Working Papers Series 1097, The University of Melbourne.
    7. Donald Bruce & William F. Fox & M. H. Tuttle, 2006. "Tax Base Elasticities: A Multi‐State Analysis of Long‐Run and Short‐Run Dynamics," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 73(2), pages 315-341, October.
    8. Duncombe, William, 1992. "Economic Change and the Evolving State Tax Structure: The Case of the Sales Tax," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 45(3), pages 299-313, September.
    9. Yilin Hou, 2005. "Fiscal Reserves and State Own-Source Expenditure in Downturn Years," Public Finance Review, , vol. 33(1), pages 117-144, January.
    10. David L. Sjoquist & Mary Beth Walker & Sally Wallace, 2005. "Estimating Differential Responses to Local Fiscal Conditions: A Mixture Model Analysis," Public Finance Review, , vol. 33(1), pages 36-61, January.
    11. Elizabeth T. Powers, 2000. "Block Granting Welfare: Fiscal Impact on the States," Economic Development Quarterly, , vol. 14(4), pages 323-339, November.
    12. Howard Chernick & Cordelia Reimers & Jennifer Tennant, 2014. "Tax structure and revenue instability: the Great Recession and the states," IZA Journal of Labor Policy, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 3(1), pages 1-22, December.
    13. Jason Bram & Andrew F. Haughwout & James A. Orr & Robert W. Rich & Rae D. Rosen, 2004. "The linkage between regional economic indexes and tax bases: evidence from New York," Staff Reports 188, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    14. Yota Deli & Derek Lambert & Martina Lawless & Kieran McQuinn & Edgar L. W. Morgenroth, 2017. "How Sensitive is Irish Income Tax Revenue to Underlying Economic Activity?," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 48(3), pages 317-336.
    15. Zhao, Bo, 2016. "Saving for a rainy day: Estimating the needed size of U.S. state budget stabilization funds," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 130-152.
    16. Phil Dean & Maclean Gaulin & Nathan Seegert & Mu-Jeung Yang, 2023. "The COVID-19 state sales tax windfall," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 30(5), pages 1408-1434, October.
    17. di Bella, Enrico & Gandullia, Luca & Leporatti, Lucia, 2014. "Short and long run income elasticity of gambling tax bases: evidence from Italy," MPRA Paper 73757, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Ariel Alexi & Teddy Lazebnik & Labib Shami, 2024. "Microfounded Tax Revenue Forecast Model with Heterogeneous Population and Genetic Algorithm Approach," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 63(5), pages 1705-1734, May.
    19. Harvey Cutler & Martin Shields & Stephen Davies, 2018. "Can State Tax Policy Increase Economic Activity and Reduce Inequality?," Growth and Change, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 49(1), pages 142-164, March.
    20. Fricke, Hans & Süssmuth, Bernd, 2014. "Growth and Volatility of Tax Revenues in Latin America," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 114-138.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    revenue forecast errors; capital gains taxation; state personal income taxation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H71 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue
    • H72 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Budget and Expenditures
    • H24 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Personal Income and Other Nonbusiness 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:sae:pubfin:v:51:y:2023:i:5:p:649-668. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    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.