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Fraud Deterrence in Dynamic Mirrleesian Economies

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  • Thomas Mertens

    (NYU Stern)

  • Roc Armenter

    (FRB Philadelphia)

Abstract

Social and private insurance schemes rely on legal action to deter fraud and tax evasion. This observation guides us to introduce a random state-verification technology in a dynamic economy with private information. With some probability, an agent's skill level becomes known to the planner who prescribes a punishment if the agent is caught misreporting. We show how deferring consumption can ease the provision of incentives. As a result, the marginal benefit may be below the marginal cost of investment in the constrained efficient allocation suggesting a subsidy on capital. We characterize conditions such that the intertemporal wedge is negative in finite horizon economies. In an infinite-horizon economy, we find that the constrained efficient allocation converges to a high level of consumption, full insurance, and no labor distortions for any probablity of state-verification.

Suggested Citation

  • Thomas Mertens & Roc Armenter, 2010. "Fraud Deterrence in Dynamic Mirrleesian Economies," 2010 Meeting Papers 468, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    • Handle: RePEc:red:sed010:468
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Kotsogiannis, Christos & Mateos-Planas, Xavier, 2019. "Tax evasion as contingent debt," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 100941, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Cheng Wang, 2005. "Dynamic costly state verification," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 25(4), pages 887-916, June.
    3. Zoutman, Floris T. & Jacobs, Bas, 2016. "Optimal redistribution and monitoring of labor supply," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 15-31.
    4. Yunmin Chen & YiLi Chien & Michael T. Owyang, 2015. "Individual and Aggregate Constrained Efficient Intertemporal Wedges in Dynamic Mirrleesian Economies," Working Papers 2015-43, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
    5. Ravikumar, B. & ,, 2012. "Optimal auditing and insurance in a dynamic model of tax compliance," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 7(2), May.
    6. Christos Kotsogiannis & Xavier Mateos-Planas, 2019. "Tax Evasion as Contingent Debt," Discussion Papers 1903, Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM).

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