Distortionary Taxes and the Provision of Public Goods

Public Goods Provision , Inequality and Taxes ∗

The impact of redistributive policies on voluntary contributions is still not well understood. While a higher level of redistributive taxation decreases the price of voluntary giving, it also changes the income distribution by decreasing income inequality. This paper provides a controlled laboratory experiment to investigate the net impact of the tax rate on public goods provision. The experime...

The efficient provision of public goods through non-distortionary tax contests∗

We use a simple balanced budget contest to collect taxes on a private good in order to finance a pure public good. We show that—with an appropriately chosen structure of winning probabilities—this contest can provide the public good efficiently and without distorting private consumption. We provide extensions to multiple public goods and private taxation sources, asymmetric preferences, and sho...

Benefit-Cost Analysis and Distortionary Taxes: A Public Choice Approach

Corporate Provision of Public Goods∗

Firms spend considerable amounts on socially responsible business practices. These expenditures are often seen as an indirect form of profit maximization or a perquisite of the manager at shareholder expense. We offer a more direct explanation. Since shareholders enjoy both consumption and private benefits from public goods, managers acting on their behalf will (1) provision more public goods t...

Public Provision of Private Goods

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