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The Political Economy of Subsidized Day Care

Author

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  • Theodore C. Bergstrom
  • Sören Blomquist

Abstract

This paper presents a theoretical model of political support for the public provision of day care. In an economy where there are high taxes on wage income, sel sh taxpayers with no children in the day care system may favor substantial public subsidies to day care because such subsidies induce mothers to join the labor force and hence pay income tax. Our model makes explicit quantitative predictions of the relation between the distribution of wages, the income tax rate, and the subsidy rate for day care that maximizes net tax revenue from parents of small children. Applying parameter values from Sweden and the United States, we nd that our model predicts a subsidy rate of between 50% and 100% for Sweden with its high tax rate on wages and between 15% and 30% for the U.S. with its lower tax rate on wages.

Suggested Citation

  • Theodore C. Bergstrom & Sören Blomquist, "undated". "The Political Economy of Subsidized Day Care," ELSE working papers 015, ESRC Centre on Economics Learning and Social Evolution.
  • Handle: RePEc:els:esrcls:015
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Day care; Labor supply; Subsidy; Taxation; Public provision of private goods; Political economy;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H42 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Publicly Provided Private Goods
    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply

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