Behavioral Responses to Taxation

这个项目的目标是提高我们对税收行为反应的理解。最终目标是通过更好地了解人们对特定种类的税收变化的反应，制定更好的税收政策。该奖项将资助两个不同的项目。第一部分考虑了股息税对企业行为的影响。2003年，公司股息的最高联邦税率大幅下降。调查人员将研究税率的下降如何改变公司关于是否发放股息和股息规模的决定。在之前的工作中，研究者和合著者已经表明，2003年的变化导致了股息的显著增加和发放股息的公司数量的显著增加。这笔奖金将用于资助旨在确定股权构成与股息行为之间关系的额外工作。高管和机构持股水平高的公司与拥有大量小投资者的公司的反应不同吗？第二个项目考虑购车者如何应对两种不同税种的变化：销售税（在购买汽车时支付）和消费税（在车主拥有汽车的年限内征收，取决于估计的二手车价值）。一项对州级汇总数据的初步研究表明，当销售税增加时，新车购买量会下降，但当消费税增加时，新车购买量不会变化。该项目将使用新车销售的详细数据来确定情况是否属实。PI还计划发展一种经济理论，以确定是否存在对“隐性”税收的社会最优使用，这些税收不会以重大方式影响个人行为，因为它们没有得到很好的理解。

The goal of this project is to improve our understanding of behavioral responses to taxation. The ultimate aim is to develop better tax policies using a better understanding of how people respond to specific kinds of tax changes.This award will fund two distinct projects. The first considers the effects of dividend taxation on firm behavior. In 2003, the maximum federal tax rate on corporate dividends substantially decreased. The investigator will examine how this drop in the tax rate changed the decisions made by corporations about whether to grant dividends and the size of such dividends. In previous work, the investigator and a co-author have shown that the 2003 changes led to a marked increase in dividends and a marked increase in the number of firms granting dividends. This award will fund additional work designed to determine the relationship between ownership composition and dividend behavior. Did firms with high levels of executive and institutional ownership respond differently than firms with large numbers of small investors?The second project considers how car buyers respond to changes in two different kinds of taxes: sales taxes (which are paid at the time a car is purchased), and excise taxes (which are levied on car owners during their years of ownership and depend on the estimated used-car value). A preliminary study of state-level aggregate data suggests that new car purchases fall when sales taxes increase, but do not change when excise taxes increase. This project will use detailed data on new car sales to determine whether this is really the case. The PI also plans to develop an economic theory of whether or not there is any socially optimal use of "hidden" taxes, taxes that do not affect individual behavior in significant ways because they are not well understood.