Taxes, Benefits, and Careers: Complete Versus Incomplete Markets

Thomas Sargent and Lars Ljungqvist

No 6560, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: An incomplete markets life-cycle model with indivisible labour makes career lengths and human capital accumulation respond to labour tax rates and government supplied non-employment benefits. We compare aggregate and individual outcomes in this individualistic incomplete markets model with those in a comparable collectivist representative family with employment lotteries and complete insurance markets. The incomplete and complete market structures assign leisure to different types of individuals who are distinguished by their human capital and age. These microeconomic differences distinguish the two models in terms of how macroeconomic aggregates respond to some types of government supplied non-employment benefits, but remarkably, not to labor tax changes.

Keywords: Benefits; Career; Complete markets; Employment lotteries; Human capital; Incomplete markets; Indivisible labour; Labour supply elasticity; Retirement; Taxes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E24 E62 J21 J26 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dge, nep-lab and nep-mac
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Journal Article: Taxes, benefits, and careers: Complete versus incomplete markets (2008)
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