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Optimal Unemployment Insurance and Redistribution

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  • Boadway, Robin
  • Cuff, Katherine

Abstract

We characterize optimal income taxation and unemployment insurance in a search-matching framework where both voluntary and involuntary unemployment are endogenous and Nash bargaining determines wages. Individuals differ in utility when voluntarily unemployed (non-participants in the labour market) and decide whether to participate as a job seeker and if so, how much search effort to exert. Unemployment insurance trades of insurance versus moral hazard due to search. We show that it is optimal to have a positive linear wage tax without any redistributive concerns even if search is effcient so the Hosios condition is satisfied. We also allow for different productivity types so there is a redistributive role for the income tax and show that a proportional wage tax internalizes the macro effects arising from endogenous wages. Lump-sum income taxes and transfers can then redistribute between individuals of differing skills and employment states. Our analysis embeds optimal unemployment insurance into an extensive-margin optimal redistribution framework where transfers to the involuntary and voluntary unemployed can differ, and nests several standard models in the literature.

Suggested Citation

  • Boadway, Robin & Cuff, Katherine, 2016. "Optimal Unemployment Insurance and Redistribution," Queen's Economics Department Working Papers 274701, Queen's University - Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:quedwp:274701
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.274701
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    Cited by:

    1. is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Lavecchia, Adam M., 2020. "Minimum wage policy with optimal taxes and unemployment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 190(C).
    3. Ferey, Antoine, 2022. "Redistribution and Unemployment Insurance," Rationality and Competition Discussion Paper Series 345, CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition.
    4. Guillaume Wilemme, 2021. "Optimal Taxation to Correct Job Mismatching," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 40, pages 170-197, April.
    5. Sahin Avcioglu & Bilgehan Karabay, 2020. "Labor market regulation under self‐enforcing contracts," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 22(6), pages 1965-2018, December.
    6. Boadway,Robin & Cuff,Katherine, 2022. "Tax Policy," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781108949453, January.
    7. Germain, Antoine, 2023. "Basic income versus fairness: redistribution with inactive agents," LIDAM Discussion Papers CORE 2023022, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    8. da Costa, Carlos E. & Maestri, Lucas J. & Santos, Marcelo R., 2022. "Redistribution with labor market frictions," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 201(C).

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    Keywords

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    JEL classification:

    • H21 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Efficiency; Optimal Taxation
    • H3 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents
    • J6 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers

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