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We study majority voting over selfishly optimal nonlinear income tax schedules proposed by a continuum of workers who can migrate between two competing jurisdictions. Both skill level and migration cost are the private information of each worker who will propose an allocation schedule that maximizes the utility of her own type. We identify reasonable scenarios in which the first-order approach applies and hence the second-order sufficient condition for incentive compatibility is fulfilled; otherwise, we need to apply the ironing surgery developed by Brett and Weymark (Games Econ Behav 101:172–188, 2017). Under quasilinear-in-consumption preferences, we show that the tax schedule proposed by the median skill type is the Condorcet winner, and provide a complete characterization of this tax schedule. While this schedule features negative marginal tax rates for low-skilled workers, it features positive rates for high-skilled workers with small migration elasticities; the marginal tax rates at the bottom and top skill levels cannot be unambiguously signed. Moreover, we detail the conditions under which migration induces uniformly higher or lower equilibrium marginal tax rates facing both low- and high-skilled workers than their counterparts in autarky, which leads us to conclude that geographic mobility does not always limit the government's ability to redistribute incomes via tax-transfer systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent evidence suggests that globalization has reduced the barriers to international labor mobility and induced more cross-country social comparisons. In an open economy with tax-driven migration and consumption externalities (relativity), we derive an optimal tax formula that subsumes existing ones obtained under a maximin social objective and additively separable utility and sign the second-best (Mirrleesian) marginal tax rates for all skill levels. We establish the thresholds of the elasticity and level of migration to determine when relativity and inequality act as complements or substitutes in shaping the optimal top tax rate. Under both Nash and Stackelberg tax competition if the migration probability of top-income workers is approximately 50%, numerical calculation using parameter estimates from empirical studies shows that the country with labor inflow (outflow) implements over 10% lower (higher) marginal tax rates than suggested by the autarky equilibrium of Kanbur and Tuomala (2013). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We evaluate in terms of equilibrium world welfare the principle of national treatment (NT) in Southern patent protection. We use a variety-expansion model with R&D in North and South, and with Southern imitation targeted at both foreign and domestic innovations. In the short-run of Northern economy, NT can never dominate discrimination in the sense of generating a higher world welfare, and it tends to be dominated by discrimination. In the long-run of Northern economy, we obtain three results. First, under free trade, NT is favorable to the North while discrimination is favorable to the South. Second, if the entry cost of Northern R&D market is high and the strength of protection for Northern innovation under discrimination is not that weak, then NT is strictly dominated by discrimination, no matter whether trade barriers exist or not. Third, if trade barriers are sufficiently large, then NT dominates discrimination only when the strength of protection for Northern innovation under discrimination is weak; otherwise, NT is strictly dominated by discrimination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to use a variety-expanding growth model embedded in the North–South framework to study the implementation of globally desirable protection of intellectual property rights (IPRs) in the emerging South.Design/methodology/approach The authors use a variety-expanding growth model with innovation-led economic growth in both North and South. As usual, imitations targeted equally at Northern and Southern innovations only occur in the South, and the authors focus on the design of Southern IPR protection.Findings Welfare-maximizing degrees of Southern IPR protection are explicitly derived for both North and South. There tends to exist a North–South conflict on the right degree of protection. To resolve this conflict, the Southern government can grant appropriate subsides to support domestic innovators. The authors derive the right rate of innovation subsidies such that the conflict is resolved.Originality/value This paper represents the first attempt to deal with the North–South conflict on the degree of Southern IPR protection within the variety-expanding growth model. And the novel perspective is to relax the North–South tension on IPR protection via additionally implementing an appropriate innovation subsidy policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to study whether it is a rational choice for a tax authority to impose an exit tax on capitalists.Design/methodology/approach The tax authority chooses a lump-sum exit tax to maximize a weighted objective of expected tax revenue and expected tax horizon. The tax revene consists of capital income taxes and exit taxes. Capitalists are motivated by sustainable capital accumulation and hence maximize the terminal capital stock.Findings The author finds that the objective function of the tax authority is strictly increasing in the exit tax, which holds for extensions with sales tax, labor income tax or proportional exit tax, and hence equilibrium exit tax is equal to an exogenous upper bound.Originality/value To the author’s knowledge, no existing literature investigates this issue theoretically, and hence the current paper represents the first attempt. The author hopes this theoretical analysis can trigger related empirical studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we use a classical variety-expanding growth model to analyze the policy or institutional-arrangement choice for the Southern government who faces the tradeoff between imitating Northern innovation without cost and encouraging domestic innovation. We assume that the Southern government fully respects the principle of non-discrimination and hence treats both imitations, i.e., imitation of Northern innovation and imitation of domestic innovation, equally. For a given state of the economy, we explicitly and uniquely establish an optimal degree of intellectual property rights (IPR) protection for the South. Then, we find that there is a complementary relationship between optimal IPR protection and the innovation subsidy policy, which implies that they form an effective policy mix, hence offering a useful insight for avoiding ineffective policy conflicts widely occurred in real-world economies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to study the problem of optimal Ramsey taxation in a finite-planning-horizon, representative-agent endogenous growth model including government expenditures as a productive input in capital formation and also with hidden actions. Design/methodology/approach – Technically, Malliavin calculus and forward integrals are naturally introduced into the macroeconomic theory when economic agents are faced with different information structures arising from a non-Markovian environment. Findings – The major result shows that the well-known Judd-Chamley Theorem holds almost surely if the depreciation rate is strictly positive, otherwise Judd-Chamley Theorem only holds for a knife-edge case or on a Lebesgue measure-zero set when the physical capital is completely sustainable. Originality/value – The author believes that the approach developed as well as the major result established is new and relevant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]