The Value-Added Tax Reform Puzzle

Jing Cai and Ann Harrison

No 17532, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: We explore the impact of a tax reform in some provinces of China which eliminated the value-added tax on some investment goods. While the goal of the experiment was to encourage upgrading of technology, our results suggest that there was no evident increase overall in fixed investment, and employment fell significantly in the treated provinces and sectors. The reform reduced the total number of employees for all types of firms. For domestic firms, it reduced employment by almost 8%. Our results are robust to a variety of approaches, and suggest that the primary impact of the policy has been to induce labor-saving growth. This experiment has since been extended to the rest of China.

JEL-codes: F21 F23 H25 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-acc, nep-cis, nep-cna, nep-pub and nep-tra
Note: ITI
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (15)

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Working Paper: The value-added tax reform puzzle (2011)
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