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Pareto Improving Taxes

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We show that in almost every economy with separable externalities, every competitive equilibrium can be Pareto improved by a package of anonymous commodity taxes that causes prices to adjust and markets to reclear at different levels of individual consumption. This constrained suboptimality of competitive allocations might provide a rationale for economic policy in economies with externalities. It shows that policy makers should look for good tax packages that help everybody, rather than thinking taxes must inevitably be bad for some lobby that will oppose them.

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  • John Geanakoplos & H. M. Polemarchakis, 2008. "Pareto Improving Taxes," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 1662, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    • Handle: RePEc:cwl:cwldpp:1662
    Note: CFP 1235.
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    Cited by:

    1. Weerachart T. Kilenthong & Robert M. Townsend, 2014. "A Market Based Solution to Price Externalities: A Generalized Framework," NBER Working Papers 20275, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. del Mercato, Elena L. & Nguyen, Van-Quy, 2023. "Sufficient conditions for a “simple” decentralization with consumption externalities," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 209(C).
    3. Jean-Marc Bonnisseau & Elena Mercato, 2010. "Externalities, consumption constraints and regular economies," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 44(1), pages 123-147, July.
    4. Velez, Rodrigo A., 2017. "Inequity-averse preferences in general equilibrium," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 166-175.
    5. Acemoglu, Daron & ÅžimÅŸek, Alp, 2010. "Moral Hazard and Efficiency in General Equilibrium with Anonymous Trading," CEPR Discussion Papers 7821, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    6. Van Quy Nguyen, 2020. "Endowments-regarding preferences," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) halshs-02966848, HAL.
    7. Gaël Giraud & Cécile Renouard, 2011. "In search of an alternative to shareholder value maximization," Documents de travail du Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne 11038, Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1), Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne.
    8. Carvajal, Andrés & Song, Xinxi, 2022. "Implementing Lindahl allocations in a warm-glow economy," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 217(C).
    9. Elena L. Mercato & Vincenzo Platino, 2017. "On the regularity of smooth production economies with externalities: competitive equilibrium à la Nash," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 63(1), pages 287-307, January.
    10. Bisin, A. & Geanakoplos, J.D. & Gottardi, P. & Minelli, E. & Polemarchakis, H., 2011. "Markets and contracts," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(3), pages 279-288.
    11. Carvajal, Andrés & Song, Xinxi, 2022. "A simple(r) Lindahl solution to the provision of public goods with warm-glow: Efficiency and implementation," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 211(C).
    12. Debapriya Sen & Giorgos Stamatopoulos, 2019. "Decreasing Returns, Patent Licensing, and Price-Reducing Taxes," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 175(2), pages 291-307.
    13. Arvaniti, Maria & Carvajal, Andrés, 2018. "Risk externalities: When financial imperfections are not the problem, but part of the solution," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 87-100.
    14. Herakles Polemarchakis, 2015. "Markets and Efficiency," The Japanese Economic Review, Japanese Economic Association, vol. 66(2), pages 150-166, June.
    15. Pierre Yared, 2013. "Public Debt Under Limited Private Credit," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 11(2), pages 229-245, April.
    16. Guo, Xiaolei & Yang, Hai, 2010. "Pareto-improving congestion pricing and revenue refunding with multiple user classes," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 44(8-9), pages 972-982, September.
    17. Pedro Garcia-del-Barrio, 2017. "Pareto-improving income redistribution: expanding consumer access to the vaccines market," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 18(3), pages 275-313, August.
    18. Van Quy Nguyen, 2020. "Endowments-regarding preferences," Post-Print halshs-02966848, HAL.
    19. Burak Unveren, 2017. "Stability and Taxation in Monopolistic Competition," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 37(4), pages 2315-2323.
    20. Van Quy Nguyen, 2020. "Endowments-regarding preferences," Documents de travail du Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne 20017, Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1), Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Externalities; Commodity taxes; Constrained suboptimality;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D50 - Microeconomics - - General Equilibrium and Disequilibrium - - - General
    • D60 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - General
    • D62 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Externalities
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design

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