Empirical Evidence and Tax Reform: Lessons from the Mirrlees Review February 2011 Rich ard Blun de ll University College London and Institute for Fiscal Studies Layout • I. Background to the Mirrlees Review • II. Earnings Taxation • III. Taxation of Consumption and Savings • http://www.ifs .org .uk/mirrleesReview © Institute for Fiscal Studies I. Background to the Mirrlees Review • Built on a large body of economic theory and evidence. • Inspired by the Meade Report on Taxation • Review of tax design from first principles – for modern open economies in general – for the UK in particular • Commissioned papers on all the main topics, with commentaries, collected in Dimensions of Tax Design. • Received submissions and held discussions with some tax experts. The Mirrlees Review • Two volumes: - ‘Dimensions of Tax Design’: published April 2010 - a set o f 1 3 ch apters on par ti cul ar ar eas by IF S researchers + international experts, along with expert commentaries (MRI) - ‘Tax by Design’: published Nov 2010 - an itintegra tdted p iticture o ftf tax d es ign and re form, written by the editors (MRII) – http://www.ifs.org.uk/mirrleesReview The Mirrlees Review Reforming the Tax System for the 21st Century Editorial Team Chairman: Sir James Mirrlees Tim Besleyy( (LSE, Bank of Eng land & IFS) Richard Blundell (IFS & UCL) Malcolm Gammie QC (One Essex Court & IFS) James Poterba (MIT & NBER) with: Stuart Adam (IFS) Steve Bond (Oxford & IFS) Robert Chote (IFS) Paul Johnson (IFS & Frontier) Gareth Myles (Exeter & IFS) Dimensions of Tax Design: commissioned chapters and expert commentaries • The base for direct taxation James Banks and Peter Diamond; Commentators: Robert Hall; John Kay; Pierre Pestieau • Means testing and tax rates on earnings Mike Brewer, Emmanuel Saez and Andrew Shephard; Commentators: Hilary Hoynes; Guy Laroque; Robert Moffitt • Value added tax and excises Ian Crawford, Michael Keen and Stephen Smith; Commentators: Richard Bird; Ian Dickson/David White; Jon Gruber • EiEnvironmen tlttital taxation Don Fullerton, Andrew Leicester and Stephen Smith; Commentators: Lawrence Goulder;;g Agnar Sandmo • Taxation of wealth and wealth transfers Robin Boadway, Emma Chamberlain and Carl Emmerson; Commentators: HlHelmut hCh Cremer; Thomas Piketty; Mart in Wea le Dimensions of Tax Design: commissioned chapters and expert commentaries • International capital taxation Rachel Griffith, James Hines and Peter Birch Sørensen; Commentators: Julian Alworth; Roger Gordon and Jerry Hausman • Taxing corporate income Alan Auerbach,,p; Mike Devereux and Helen Simpson; Commentators: Harry Huizinga; Jack Mintz • Taxation of small businesses Claire Crawford and Judith Freedman • The effect of taxes on consumption and saving Orazio Attanasio and Matthew Wakefield • Administration and compliance, Jonathan Shaw, Joel Slemrod and John Whiting; Commentators: John Hasseldine; Anne Redston; Richard Highfield • Political economy of tax reform, James Alt, Ian Preston and Luke Sibieta; Commentator: Guido Tabellini We started from a structure of taxes and benefits that.. • Does not work as a system – Lack of joining up between welfare benefits, personal taxes and corporate taxes • Is not neutral where it should be – Inconsistent savings taxes and a corporate tax system that favours debt over equity • Is not well designed where it should deviate from neutrality – A mass of different tax rates on carbon and failure to price congestion proper ly • Does not achieve progressivity efficiently – VAT zero and reduced rating a poor way to redistribute, and taxes and benefits damage work incentives more than necessary • Focus here on taxation of earnings, with some discussion of indirect taxation and taxation of savings: • Leading examples of the mix of theory and evidence • Key implications for tax design • Earnings taxation, in particular, takes most of the strain in distributional adjustments of other parts of the reform package • CidthlfidlConsider the role of evidence loose ly organ idised under five headings: 1. Key margins of adjustment to tax reform 2. Measurement of effective tax rates 3. The importance of information and complexity 4. Evidence on the size of responses 5. Implications from theory for tax design Draw on new empirical evidence: – some examples • Labour supply responses for individuals and families – at the intensive and extensive margins – bddhittby age and demographic structure • Taxable income elasticities – top of the income distribution using tax return information • Consumer responses to indirect taxation – interaction with labour supply and variation of price elasticities • Intertemporal behaviour – consumption, savings and pensions – ppggersistence and magnitude of earnings shocks over the life- cycle • Ability to (micro-)simulate marginal and average rates – simulate potential reforms II. Earnings Taxation • This section will analyse the context, the impact and the design of earnings tax reforms • It will focus on two questions: – How should we measure the impact of taxation on work decisions and earnings? – How should we assess the optimality of tax reforms? • Sub-heading: Labor Supply Responses at the Extensive Marggyin: What Do We Know and Why Does It Matter? • Key chapter (in Mirrlees Review): Brewer, Saez and Shephard, http://www.ifs .org .uk/mirrleesReview • + commentaries by Moffitt, Laroque and Hoynes Draw on new empirical evidence: – some examples • labour supply responses for individuals and families – at the intensive and extensive margins – by age and demographic structure • taxable income elasticities – top of the income distribution using tax return information • income uncertainty – persistence and magnitude of earnings shocks over the life-cycle • ability to (micro-)simulate marginal and average rates – simulate reforms The extensive – intensive distinction is important for a n umber of reasons: • Understanding responses to tax and welfare reform – Jim Heckman, David Wise, Ed Prescott, etc.. all highlight the importance of extensive labour supply margin, – a balance needs to be struck between the two margins…. • The size of extensive and intensive responses are also key parameters in the recent literature on earnings tax design – used heavily in the Review. • But the relative importance of the extensive margin is specific to particular groups – I’ll examine a specific case of low earning families in more detail in what follows • So where are the key margins of response? • Evidence suggests they are not all the extensive margin.. – in tensi ve and ext ensi ve margi ns b oth matt er – they matter for tax policy evaluation and earnings tax design – and they matter in different ways by age and demographic groups • Getting it right for men Employment for men by age – FR, UK and US 2007 100% 90% FR UK 80% US 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 46 48 50 52 54 56 58 60 62 64 66 68 70 72 74 Blundell, Bozio and Laroque (2010) Total Hours for men by age – FR, UK and US 2007 2000 FR UK 1750 US 1500 1250 1000 750 500 250 0 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 46 48 50 52 54 56 58 60 62 64 66 68 70 72 74 Blundell, Bozio and Laroque (2010) and for women ….. Female Employment by age – US, FR and UK 1977 0.90 0.80 FR UK 0.70 US 0.60 0.50 0.40 0300.30 0.20 0.10 0.00 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 46 48 50 52 54 56 58 60 62 64 66 68 70 72 74 Blundell, Bozio and Laroque (2010) Female Employment by age – US, FR and UK 2007 0.90 0.80 FR UK 0.70 US 0600.60 0.50 0.40 0300.30 0.20 0.10 0000.00 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 46 48 50 52 54 56 58 60 62 64 66 68 70 72 74 Blundell, Bozio and Laroque (2010) Female Total Hours by age – US, FR and UK 2007 1600 1400 FR UK US 1200 1000 800 600 400 200 0 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 46 48 50 52 54 56 58 60 62 64 66 68 70 72 74 Blundell, Bozio and Laroque (2010) Decomposition of change in annual hours worked (1977-2007) 1400 United-States 1300 2007: 1308 hours 1977: 1212 hours 1977: 1148 1200 hours 1977: 1124 hours 1100 2007: 1094 hours 1000 2007: 953 United-Kingdom hours 900 Change in structure Women 55-74 France Men 55-74 Women 30-54 M30Men 30-54 W16Women 16-29 800 Men 16-29 © Institute for Fiscal Studies Blundell, Bozio and Laroque (2010) Thinking about Responses at the Intensive and EtExtensi ve M argi in ⎧ h11/+ α • Write within period utility as ⎪ch−−β if > 0 U = ⎨ 11/+ α ⎪ ⎩ch if = 0 • α is the intensive labour supply elasticity and she works when the value of working at wage w exceeds the fixed cost β. • Convenient to describe the distribution of heterogeneity through the conditional distribution of β given α,,( F(β| α) and the marginal distribution of α. • The labour supply and employment rate for individuals of type α, is 1+α α ⎛⎞w hFh()(ww,α) == and pw (,α) F ⎜⎟ ⎝⎠1+α • The i n tensi ve and the emp loymen t ra te e las tic ity are (+1)αα (+ 1) (+1)α ⎛⎞⎛⎞ww εαI ()== α and εαE ()wf⎜⎟⎜⎟ / F ⎝⎠⎝⎠11++α α • The aggregate hours elasticity is a weighted sum across the intensive and extensive margins 1+αα 1+ dHln 1 ααα⎛⎞ w1+ ⎛⎞ w =+∫[αwF⎜⎟||ααα ww f ⎜⎟]() dG dwHlnα ⎝⎠ 1++αα ⎝⎠ 1 1 =+p(,)(,)[()whwα αεα εα ()]() dG α ∫ IE H α • Of course, quasi-linear utility is highly restrictive and we expect income effects to matter, at least for some types of households – we use more general models with fixed costs Measuring Responses at the Intensive and Extensive Margin • Suppose the population share at time t of type j is qjt, then J total hours HHHhHtjtjtjtjtjt= ∑ q HH and = p h j=1 • Changes in total hours per person