Taxation and the Superrich

Florian Scheuer and Joel Slemrod

Annual Review of Economics, 2020, vol. 12, issue 1, 189-211

Abstract: This article addresses the modern optimal tax progressivity literature, which clarifies the key role of the behavioral response to taxation and accounts for the incomes of the superrich being qualitatively different from others. Some of the superrich may be “superstars” for whom small differences in talent are magnified into much larger earnings differences, while others may work in winner-take-all markets, such that their effort to climb the ladder of success reduces the returns to others. We stress that pivotal tax-rate elasticities are not structural parameters and will be smaller the broader and less plastic is the tax base and the more effective is the enforcement of tax evasion. For this reason, normative analysis of tax rates should be accompanied by attention to the tax base, with a special focus on capital gains, which comprise a large fraction of the taxable income of the superrich.

Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (18)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-economics-081919-115106
Full text downloads are only available to subscribers. Visit the abstract page for more information.

Related works:
Working Paper: Taxation and the Superrich (2019)
Working Paper: Taxation and the Superrich (2019)
Working Paper: Taxation and the Superrich (2019)
Working Paper: Taxation and the superrich (2019)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:anr:reveco:v:12:y:2020:p:189-211

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.annualreviews.org/action/ecommerce

DOI: 10.1146/annurev-economics-081919-115106

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Annual Review of Economics from Annual Reviews Annual Reviews 4139 El Camino Way Palo Alto, CA 94306, USA.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by http://www.annualreviews.org ().