On the political economy of nonlinear income taxation

The political economy setting of voting over general nonlinear income taxes with labor disincentives and information asymmetry in consumer/worker/voter types is considered. The economy is the realization of a finite draw from a continuous distribution. The revenue required from a draw is determined by Pareto optimal provision of a public good for that draw. Assuming that the government must meet the revenue requirement for any possible draw, in other words the tax is robust, a majority rule equilibrium is shown to exist at the median voter's preferred tax function out of this robust set.