Publications

Read Now

28 Apr 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Payout Policy

Keywords: by Joan Farre-Mensa, Roni Michaely & Martin C. Schmalz

07 Apr 2008
Research & Ideas

The Debate over Taxing Foreign Profits

activity is the basis of much of tax policy and also of the rising concern over the global activities of American multinational firms. While a popular belief, it doesn't seem to hold up to closer scrutiny.... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

1980
Book

Tax and Investment Policies for Hard Minerals: Public and Multinational Enterprises in Indonesia

By: Malcolm Gillis, Ralph Beals, Glenn Jenkins, L. T. Wells Jr. and Ulrich Peterson

Keywords: Taxation; Investment; Policy; Metals and Minerals; Multinational Firms and Management; Indonesia

14 Dec 2010
Op-Ed

Tax US Companies to Spur Spending

another repatriation tax holiday. Coupling these policies provides a carrot and stick for managers to begin to repatriate cash and use it productively at home. The combined revenue effects is likely to be... View Details

Keywords: by Mihir A. Desai

October 2011
Article

The Surprising Power of Age-Dependent Taxes

By: Matthew C. Weinzierl

This article provides a new, empirically driven application of the dynamic Mirrleesian framework by studying a feasible and potentially powerful tax reform: age-dependent labor income taxation. I show analytically how age dependence improves policy on both the... View Details

Keywords: Taxation; Policy; Age; Income; Mathematical Methods; Welfare; United States

Read Now

February 2015
Supplement

The Affordable Care Act (D): Making a Decision on the Employer-Sponsored Health Insurance Tax Exclusion

By: Joseph L. Bower and Michael Norris

In the summer of 2009, a meeting is called in the White House to discuss the impact of changing the rules on the employer-sponsored health insurance tax exclusion. View Details

Keywords: Health Care; Health Care Policy; Health; Government and Politics; Health Industry; United States

March 2007 (Revised March 2010)
Case

Rovna Dan: The Flat Tax in Slovakia

By: Laura Alfaro, Rafael M. Di Tella, Ane Damgaard Jensen and Vincent Marie Dessain

Explores the tax policy choices made by Slovakia and the impact of reforms. Set in 2006, looks at the decision facing new Prime Minister Robert Fico as he faces the public's "reform fatigue." Traces the development of tax and fiscal policies since Slovakia's... View Details

Keywords: Investment; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; Taxation; Labor; Welfare; Slovakia

Educators

08 Feb 2018
Op-Ed

What’s Missing From the Debate About Trump’s Tax Plan

EtiAmmos The tax policy we choose as a society reveals our collective values. That is why battles over it are so fierce—and justified. When we debate tax policy, we are... View Details

Keywords: by Matthew Weinzierl

30 Apr 2007
Research & Ideas

All Eyes on Slovakia’s Flat Tax

As interest in the flat tax grows, the world seems transfixed on an unlikely country, Slovakia, whose 3-year-old tax reform program is paying early dividends. Essentially applying a uniform View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

2014
Chapter

Payout Policy

By: Joan Farre-Mensa, Roni Michaely and Martin Schmalz

We survey the literature on payout policy, with a particular emphasis on developments in the last two decades. Of the traditional motives of why firms pay out (agency, signaling, and taxes), the cross-sectional empirical evidence is most persuasive in favor of agency... View Details

Keywords: Finance; Investment; Financial Services Industry

SSRN

20 Dec 2006
Op-Ed

Investors Hurt by Dual-Track Tax Reporting

goal. Profits reported to tax authorities and to capital markets were essentially the same. Over time, well-considered exceptions—expensing of investments, for example—were introduced to advance policy goals... View Details

Keywords: by Mihir Desai

15 Apr 2015
Research & Ideas

Why Americans Voted for an Income Tax

same time, we want to support those in need, to give them a "fair shot," so we make use of policies such as the earned income tax credit, childcare subsidies, and Medicaid to help people work their... View Details

Keywords: by Matthew C. Weinzierl

18 Jul 2005
Research & Ideas

Time to Rethink the Corporate Tax System?

Corporations have traditionally considered taxes a painful but necessary cost of doing business. But this view has changed, says Harvard Business School professor Mihir A. Desai. With the advent of sophisticated View Details

Keywords: by Ann Cullen

05 Aug 2011
Working Paper Summaries

An Exploration of Optimal Stabilization Policy

Keywords: by N. Gregory Mankiw & Matthew C. Weinzierl

January 2009 (Revised October 2011)
Case

Barack Obama and the Bush Tax Cuts (A)

By: Matthew C. Weinzierl and Eric D. Werker

As his inauguration approached, President-elect Obama faced a financial sector meltdown, a costly bailout, and massive government deficits. With the economy in recession, interest rates near zero, and joblessness on the rise, Obama needed to decide whether, and how... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Financial Crisis; Borrowing and Debt; Financial Management; Policy; Government Administration; Taxation; United States

Educators

March 2012
Article

Macroeconomic Policy and U.S. Competitiveness

By: Richard H.K. Vietor and Matthew Weinzierl

The United States is on a glide path to fiscal disaster, with experts projecting that the federal government will take in far less money than it spends-indefinitely. Our current fiscal policy is eroding competitiveness in several ways, and business conditions in the... View Details

Keywords: Macroeconomics; Government and Politics; Financial Crisis; Policy; Competition; Public Administration Industry; United States

November 2021
Article

A Salient Sugar Tax Decreases Sugary Drink Buying

By: Grant E. Donnelly, Paige Guge, Ryan Howell and Leslie John

Many governments have introduced sugary drink excise taxes to reduce purchasing and consumption of such drinks; however, they do not typically stipulate how such taxes should be communicated at point-of-purchase. Historical, field, and experimental data entailing over... View Details

Keywords: Decision-making; Open Data; Open Materials; Preregistered; Health; Policy; Taxation; Consumer Behavior; Decision Making