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Evidence on the insurance effect of marginal income taxes

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  • Grant, Charles
  • Koulovatianos, Christos
  • Michaelides, Alexander
  • Padula, Mario

Abstract

Marginal income taxes may have an insurance effect by decreasing the effective fluctuations of after-tax individual income. By compressing the idiosyncratic component o personal income fluctuations, higher marginal taxes should be negatively correlated with the dispersion of consumption across households, a necessary implication of an insurance effect of taxation. Our study empirically examines this negative correlation, exploiting the ample variation of state taxes across US states. We show that taxes are negatively correlated with the consumption dispersion of the within-state distribution of non-durable consumption and that this correlation is robust.

Suggested Citation

  • Grant, Charles & Koulovatianos, Christos & Michaelides, Alexander & Padula, Mario, 2008. "Evidence on the insurance effect of marginal income taxes," CFS Working Paper Series 2008/06, Center for Financial Studies (CFS).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:cfswop:200806
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Undiversifiable Earnings Risk; Consumption Insurance; Tax Distortions;

    JEL classification:

    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • H20 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - General
    • H31 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - Household

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