 Taxation and the Worlds of WelfareYingying Deng () and Monica Prasad () No 480, LIS Working papers from LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg Abstract: We use Luxembourg Income Study data to compare the progressivity of the tax structure in the U.S. and Europe. While our study supports the arguments of other scholars that the US has more progressive taxes than the continental or social democratic countries, we also present the following qualifications: (1) While the US remains more progressive than other countries, since 1991 its tax structure is in fact regressive. All other countries for which it is possible to calculate overall regressivity have always been, and remain, regressive overall. (2) Britain's tax structure is as regressive as Sweden's. (3) It is a mistake to consider particular kinds of taxes (e.g. income or property) as progressive or regressive: there are examples of progressive property and payroll taxes, and regressive income taxes. And (4) the comparative pattern of progressivity is partly the result of the role of the value added tax in the European revenue structure, and the small role that sales taxes play in the U.S. We close with a discussion of whether the regressivity of the value added tax matters, and what agenda for future research our work suggests. Keywords: taxation; welfare state; capitalist systems (search for similar items in EconPapers) Published in Socio-Economic Review 7, no. 3 (2009): 431-457 Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:lis:liswps:480 Access Statistics for this paper More papers in LIS Working papers from LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg Contact information at EDIRC. |
Is your work missing from RePEc? Here is how to contribute.
Questions or problems? Check the EconPapers FAQ or send mail to .
EconPapers is hosted by the
School of Business at Örebro University.