IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/auu/dpaper/446.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Why the Five Economists' Plan for a "Wage-Tax Trade-Off" is a Mistake for Australia

Author

Listed:
  • Patricia Apps

Abstract

This paper presents an analysis of the Five Economists' plan for a "wage-tax trade-off", combining an EITC program with a freeze on award wage increases, as a policy package for reducing unemployment. The study identifies the changes in effective tax rates implied by the EITC program and shows that, when combined with a wage cut for the low paid, the proposed plan will increase inequality. Drawing on the findings of empirical research on behavioural responses to taxes, the study then goes on to show that the plan can be expected to reduce the efficiency and growth of the economy, due to disincentive effects on family labour supply, saving and fertility. The structure of the plan is found to have much in common with ongoing labour market and tax-benefit reforms. Both are identified as policy directions that are not in the interests of Australia, either domestically or within the context of globalisation.

Suggested Citation

  • Patricia Apps, 2002. "Why the Five Economists' Plan for a "Wage-Tax Trade-Off" is a Mistake for Australia," CEPR Discussion Papers 446, Centre for Economic Policy Research, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    • Handle: RePEc:auu:dpaper:446
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cbe.anu.edu.au/researchpapers/CEPR/DP446.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Richard Blundell & Alan Duncan & Julian McCrae & Costas Meghir, 2000. "The labour market impact of the working families’ tax credit," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 21(1), pages 75-103, March.
    2. N. Eissa & H. W. Hoynes, "undated". "The Earned Income Tax Credit and the Labor Supply of Married Couples," Institute for Research on Poverty Discussion Papers 1194-99, University of Wisconsin Institute for Research on Poverty.
    3. David E. Wildasin, 2000. "Factor mobility and fiscal policy in the EU: policy issues and analytical approaches," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 15(31), pages 338-378.
    4. Heckman, James J, 1993. "What Has Been Learned about Labor Supply in the Past Twenty Years?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(2), pages 116-121, May.
    5. Martin Feldstein & James M. Poterba, 1996. "Empirical Foundations of Household Taxation," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number feld96-1, March.
    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. Patricia Apps, 2002. "Why an Earned income tax credit program is a mistake for Australia," Australian Journal of Labour Economics (AJLE), Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre (BCEC), Curtin Business School, vol. 5(4), pages 549-568, December.
    2. Patricia Apps, 1999. "Reforming the Australian Tax Transfer System," CEPR Discussion Papers 413, Centre for Economic Policy Research, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    3. Bargain, Olivier & Orsini, Kristian, 2006. "In-work policies in Europe: Killing two birds with one stone?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(6), pages 667-697, December.
    4. Richard Blundell & Mike Brewer & Marco Francesconi, 2008. "Job Changes and Hours Changes: Understanding the Path of Labor Supply Adjustment," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 26(3), pages 421-453, July.
    5. Bargain, Olivier & Orsini, Kristian & Peichl, Andreas, 2011. "Labor Supply Elasticities in Europe and the US," IZA Discussion Papers 5820, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Olivier Bargain & Kristian Orsini & Andreas Peichl, 2014. "Comparing Labor Supply Elasticities in Europe and the United States: New Results," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 49(3), pages 723-838.
    7. Pierre-Carl Michaud & Konstantinos Tatsiramos, 2005. "Employment Dynamics of Married Women in Europe," Working Papers WR-273, RAND Corporation.
    8. Mike Brewer & Paul Gregg, 2001. "Eradicating child poverty in Britain: welfare reform and children since 1997," IFS Working Papers W01/08, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    9. Peter Haan, 2005. "State Dependence and Female Labor Supply in Germany: The Extensive and the Intensive Margin," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 538, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    10. Kleven, Henrik Jacobsen & Kreiner, Claus Thustrup, 2006. "The marginal cost of public funds: Hours of work versus labor force participation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(10-11), pages 1955-1973, November.
    11. Löffler, Max & Peichl, Andreas & Siegloch, Sebastian, 2013. "Validating Structural Labor Supply Models," VfS Annual Conference 2013 (Duesseldorf): Competition Policy and Regulation in a Global Economic Order 79819, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    12. Véronique Simonnet & Elisabeth Danzin, 2014. "L'effet du RSA sur le taux de retour à l'emploi des allocataires. Une analyse en double différence selon le nombre et l'âge des enfants," Économie et Statistique, Programme National Persée, vol. 467(1), pages 91-116.
    13. Olivier Bargain & Mathias Dolls & Dirk Neumann & Andreas Peichl & Sebastian Siegloch, 2011. "Tax-Benefit Systems in Europe and the US: Between Equity and Efficiency," CESifo Working Paper Series 3534, CESifo.
    14. Adam Looney & Monica Singhal, 2005. "The effect of anticipated tax changes on intertemporal labor supply and the realization of taxable income," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2005-44, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    15. Michaël Sicsic, 2022. "Does labour income react more to income tax or means‐tested benefits reforms?," Fiscal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 43(3), pages 291-319, September.
    16. Olivier Bargain, 2004. "On modeling household labor supply with taxation," DELTA Working Papers 2004-14, DELTA (Ecole normale supérieure).
    17. Mike Brewer, 2000. "Comparing in-work benefits and financial work incentives for low-income families in the US and the UK," IFS Working Papers W00/16, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    18. Engen, Eric M. & Skinner, Jonathan, 1996. "Taxation and Economic Growth," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 49(4), pages 617-642, December.
    19. Peter Haan, 2006. "Slowly, but Changing: How Does Genuine State Dependence Affect Female Labor Supply on the Extensive and Intensive Margin," JEPS Working Papers 06-002, JEPS.
    20. Austan Goolsbee, 1999. "Evidence on the High-Income Laffer Curve from Six Decades of Tax Reform," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 30(2), pages 1-64.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Taxation; Welfare; Globalization;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H2 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue
    • I3 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty

    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:auu:dpaper:446. 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 person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cpanuau.html .

    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.