IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ajk/ajkdps/166.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Optimal Taxation of Risky Entrepreneurial Capital

Author

Listed:
  • Corina Boar

    (New York University)

  • Matthew Knowles

    (University of Cologne)

Abstract

We study optimal taxation in a model with endogenous financial frictions, risky investment and occupational choice, where the distribution of wealth across entrepreneurs affects how efficiently capital is used. The planner chooses linear taxes on wealth, capital and labor income to maximize the steady state utility of a newborn agent. Most agents in the model are poor, leading to a redistributive motive for taxation. Optimal tax rates can be written as a closed-form function of the size of the tax bases and their elasticities with respect to tax rates. We find that it is optimal to tax capital income because financial frictions reduce the elasticity of capital income with respect to taxes and because capital income taxes prevent excessive entry into entrepreneurship. Optimal wealth taxes are positive but close to zero, since they strongly discourage capital accumulation.

Suggested Citation

  • Corina Boar & Matthew Knowles, 2022. "Optimal Taxation of Risky Entrepreneurial Capital," ECONtribute Discussion Papers Series 166, University of Bonn and University of Cologne, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:ajk:ajkdps:166
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econtribute.de/RePEc/ajk/ajkdps/ECONtribute_166_2022.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2022
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sergio Ocampo & Gueorgui Kambourov & Daphne Chen & Burhanettin Kuruscu & Fatih Guvenen, 2017. "Use It or Lose It: Efficiency Gains from Wealth Taxation," 2017 Meeting Papers 913, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    2. Thomas Piketty & Emmanuel Saez & Gabriel Zucman, 2018. "Distributional National Accounts: Methods and Estimates for the United States," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(2), pages 553-609.
    3. Raj Chetty, 2009. "Sufficient Statistics for Welfare Analysis: A Bridge Between Structural and Reduced-Form Methods," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 1(1), pages 451-488, May.
    4. Marco Cagetti & Mariacristina De Nardi, 2006. "Entrepreneurship, Frictions, and Wealth," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 114(5), pages 835-870, October.
    5. Bernanke, Ben S. & Gertler, Mark & Gilchrist, Simon, 1999. "The financial accelerator in a quantitative business cycle framework," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & M. Woodford (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 21, pages 1341-1393, Elsevier.
    6. Devereux, Michael, 2003. "Taxing Risky Investment," CEPR Discussion Papers 4053, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    7. Marco Bassetto & Wei Cui, 2020. "A Ramsey Theory of Financial Distortions," Working Papers 775, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
    8. Oleg Itskhoki & Benjamin Moll, 2019. "Optimal Development Policies With Financial Frictions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 87(1), pages 139-173, January.
    9. Marco Cagetti & Mariacristina De Nardi, 2009. "Estate Taxation, Entrepreneurship, and Wealth," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(1), pages 85-111, March.
    10. Thomas Piketty & Emmanuel Saez & Stefanie Stantcheva, 2014. "Optimal Taxation of Top Labor Incomes: A Tale of Three Elasticities," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 6(1), pages 230-271, February.
    11. Thomas Piketty & Emmanuel Saez, 2013. "A Theory of Optimal Inheritance Taxation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 81(5), pages 1851-1886, September.
    12. Chamley, Christophe, 1986. "Optimal Taxation of Capital Income in General Equilibrium with Infinite Lives," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(3), pages 607-622, May.
    13. Ludwig Straub & Iván Werning, 2020. "Positive Long-Run Capital Taxation: Chamley-Judd Revisited," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 110(1), pages 86-119, January.
    14. Chari, V.V. & Kehoe, Patrick J., 1999. "Optimal fiscal and monetary policy," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & M. Woodford (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 26, pages 1671-1745, Elsevier.
    15. Jess Benhabib & Bálint Szőke, 2021. "Optimal Positive Capital Taxes at Interior Steady States," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(1), pages 114-150, January.
    16. Diamond, Peter A & Mirrlees, James A, 1971. "Optimal Taxation and Public Production II: Tax Rules," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 61(3), pages 261-278, June.
    17. Erik Hurst & Benjamin Wild Pugsley, 2011. "What Do Small Businesses Do?," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 42(2 (Fall)), pages 73-142.
    18. Matthew Smith & Owen Zidar & Eric Zwick, 2020. "Top Wealth in America: New Estimates and Implications for Taxing the Rich," Working Papers 264, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Center for Economic Policy Studies..
    19. Biljanovska, Nina, 2019. "Optimal Policy In Collateral Constrained Economies," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 23(2), pages 798-836, March.
    20. Neil Mehrotra & Nicolas Crouzet, 2017. "Small and Large Firms over the Business Cycle," 2017 Meeting Papers 600, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    21. Abo-Zaid Salem, 2014. "Optimal capital-income taxation in a model with credit frictions," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 14(1), pages 1-26, January.
    22. Corina Boar & Virgiliu Midrigan, 2019. "Markups and Inequality," NBER Working Papers 25952, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    23. Diamond, Peter A & Mirrlees, James A, 1971. "Optimal Taxation and Public Production: I--Production Efficiency," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 61(1), pages 8-27, March.
    24. Cullen, Julie Berry & Gordon, Roger H., 2007. "Taxes and entrepreneurial risk-taking: Theory and evidence for the U.S," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(7-8), pages 1479-1505, August.
    25. Facundo Alvaredo & Lucas Chancel & Thomas Piketty & Gabriel Zucman, 2018. "Distributional National Accounts," Post-Print halshs-03342488, HAL.
    26. Mehra, Rajnish & Prescott, Edward C., 2003. "The equity premium in retrospect," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 14, pages 889-938, Elsevier.
    27. Sagiri Kitao, 2008. "Entrepreneurship, taxation and capital investment," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 11(1), pages 44-69, January.
    28. Nicolas Crouzet & Neil Mehrotra, 2017. "Small and Large Firms over the Business Cycle," Working Papers 741, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
    29. Katrine Jakobsen & Kristian Jakobsen & Henrik Kleven & Gabriel Zucman, 2020. "Wealth Taxation and Wealth Accumulation: Theory and Evidence From Denmark," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 135(1), pages 329-388.
    30. Biljanovska, Nina & Vardoulakis, Alexandros P., 2019. "Capital taxation with heterogeneous discounting and collateralized borrowing," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 97-109.
    31. Saez, Emmanuel & Stantcheva, Stefanie, 2018. "A simpler theory of optimal capital taxation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 162(C), pages 120-142.
    32. Russell W. Cooper & John C. Haltiwanger, 2006. "On the Nature of Capital Adjustment Costs," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 73(3), pages 611-633.
    33. Judd, Kenneth L., 1985. "Redistributive taxation in a simple perfect foresight model," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 59-83, October.
    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. Corina Boar & Matthew Knowles, 2020. "Entrepreneurship, Agency Frictions and Redistributive Capital Taxation," Discussion Paper Series, School of Economics and Finance 202004, School of Economics and Finance, University of St Andrews.
    2. Bastani, Spencer & Waldenström, Daniel, 2018. "How Should Capital Be Taxed? Theory and Evidence from Sweden," IZA Discussion Papers 11475, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Spencer Bastani & Daniel Waldenström, 2018. "How should capital be taxed? The Swedish experience," World Inequality Lab Working Papers hal-02878153, HAL.
    4. Emmanuel Saez & Gabriel Zucman, 2019. "Progressive Wealth Taxation," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 50(2 (Fall)), pages 437-533.
    5. Thomas Blanchet, 2022. "Uncovering the Dynamics of the Wealth Distribution," Working Papers hal-03865295, HAL.
    6. Spencer Bastani & Daniel Waldenström, 2020. "How Should Capital Be Taxed?," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 34(4), pages 812-846, September.
    7. Bonnet, Odran & Chapelle, Guillaume & Trannoy, Alain & Wasmer, Etienne, 2021. "Land is back, it should be taxed, it can be taxed," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    8. Fisman, Raymond & Gladstone, Keith & Kuziemko, Ilyana & Naidu, Suresh, 2020. "Do Americans want to tax wealth? Evidence from online surveys," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 188(C).
    9. Florian Scheuer & Joel Slemrod, 2021. "Taxing Our Wealth," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 35(1), pages 207-230, Winter.
    10. Saez, Emmanuel & Stantcheva, Stefanie, 2018. "A simpler theory of optimal capital taxation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 162(C), pages 120-142.
    11. Karl Schulz, 2021. "Redistribution of Return Inequality," CESifo Working Paper Series 8996, CESifo.
    12. Åsa Johansson, 2016. "Public Finance, Economic Growth and Inequality: A Survey of the Evidence," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 1346, OECD Publishing.
    13. Florian Scheuer & Joel Slemrod, 2020. "Taxation and the Superrich," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 12(1), pages 189-211, August.
    14. Odran Bonnet & Guillaume Flamerie de La Chapelle & Alain Trannoy & Etienne Wasmer, 2019. "Secular Trends in Wealth and Heterogeneous Capital: Land is Back... and Should Be Taxed," Working Papers hal-03570837, HAL.
    15. Chirvi, Malte & Schneider, Cornelius, 2020. "Preferences for wealth taxation: Design, framing and the role of partisanship," arqus Discussion Papers in Quantitative Tax Research 260, arqus - Arbeitskreis Quantitative Steuerlehre.
    16. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/56k383m9o9kpb1g6f8rvv74ok is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Saez, Emmanuel, 2013. "Optimal progressive capital income taxes in the infinite horizon model," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 61-74.
    18. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/1eob9f9aas9q18hfjsiqhggvi2 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Nicola Borri & Pietro Reichlin, 2021. "Optimal Taxation with Home Ownership and Wealth Inequality," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 40, pages 64-84, April.
    20. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/1eob9f9aas9q18hfjsiqhggvi2 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Mikhail Golosov & Aleh Tsyvinski & Nicolas Werquin, 2014. "A Variational Approach to the Analysis of Tax Systems," NBER Working Papers 20780, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    22. Odran Bonnet & Guillaume Chapelle & Alain Trannoy & Etienne Wasmer, 2019. "Secular Trends in Wealth and Heterogeneous Capital: Land is Back... and Should Be Taxed," Sciences Po publications 2019-14, Sciences Po.
    23. Kapeller, Jakob & Leitch, Stuart & Wildauer, Rafael, 2023. "Can a European wealth tax close the green investment gap?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 209(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Entrepreneurship; Financial Frictions; Taxation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E2 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment
    • E6 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook
    • H2 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:ajk:ajkdps:166. 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: ECONtribute Office (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.econtribute.de .

    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.