Publications

SSRN

2009
Working Paper

The Impact of Private Equity Ownership on Portfolio Firms' Corporate Tax Planning

By: Brad Badertscher, Sharon P. Katz and Sonja Olhoft Rego

This study investigates whether private equity (PE) firms influence the tax practices of their portfolio firms. Prior research documents that PE firms create economic value in portfolio firms through effective governance, financial, and operational engineering. Given... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Investment Portfolio; Corporate Governance; Taxation; Ownership Stake; Value Creation

08 Feb 2018
Op-Ed

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

George W. Bush administrations. Related Reading: Tax Reform is on the Front Burner Again. Here’s Why You Should Care Why Americans Voted for an Income Tax What do you think?... View Details

Keywords: by Matthew Weinzierl

28 Aug 2009
Working Paper Summaries

The Impact of Private Equity Ownership on Portfolio Firms’ Corporate Tax Planning

Keywords: by Brad Badertscher, Sharon P. Katz & Sonja Olhoft Rego; Financial Services

Article

Inflation and Taxes in a Growing Economy with Debt and Equity

By: M. Feldstein, Jerry R. Green and Eytan Sheshinski

Our tax system was designed for an economy with little or no inflation. The current paper shows that inflation causes capricious changes in the effective rate of tax on capital income and therefore in the real net rate of return that savers receive. This is not only a... View Details

Keywords: Taxation; Inflation and Deflation; Economy

Article

Tax Policy and the Efficiency of U.S. Direct Investment Abroad

By: Mihir A. Desai, C. Fritz Foley and James R. Hines Jr.

Deferral of U.S. taxes on foreign source income is commonly characterized as a subsidy to foreign investment, as reflected in its inclusion among "tax expenditures" and occasional calls for its repeal. This paper analyzes the extent to which tax deferral and other... View Details

Keywords: International Taxation; Dynamic Efficiency; Deferral; Policy; Taxation; Performance Efficiency; Foreign Direct Investment; Investment Funds; Investment Return; Business Earnings; Equity; Financing and Loans; Cash Flow; Capital; United States

SSRN

December 2013 (Revised June 2014)
Case

Choosing a Charitable Giving Vehicle

By: Robert C. Pozen, Mayur Desai and Maura A. Graul

Elaine White is an accountant advising two couples, the Carsons and the Bradleys, regarding their charitable giving options and related tax strategies. The Carsons are an upper-middle class family with $295,000 in income, a moderate amount of deductions, and... View Details

Keywords: Charitable Giving; Tax Accounting; Tax Strategy; Public Charities; Foundations; Charity; Charitable Remainder Trusts; Charitable Lead Trusts; Donor-Advised Funds; Pooled Income Funds; Taxation; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; United States

Educators

Purchase

07 Nov 2016
Research & Ideas

Corporate Tax Strategies Mirror Personal Returns of Top Execs

companies and their shareholders. It’s no secret that companies with similar financials often pay very dissimilar amounts of tax in a given year. The same is true of individuals. One need look no further than Republican presidential... View Details

Keywords: by Roberta Holland

July 2021
Article

Invisible Inequality Leads to Punishing the Poor and Rewarding the Rich

By: Oliver P. Hauser, Gordon T. Kraft-Todd, David Rand, Martin A. Nowak and Michael I. Norton

Four experiments examine how the lack of awareness of inequality affects behaviour towards the rich and poor. In Experiment 1, participants who became aware that wealthy individuals donated a smaller percentage of their income switched from rewarding the wealthy to... View Details

Keywords: Income Transparency; Income; Wealth; Equality and Inequality; Knowledge; Behavior; Outcome or Result; Society; Policy

December 2013
Teaching Note

Choosing a Charitable Giving Vehicle

By: Robert C. Pozen, Mayur Desai and Maura A. Graul

Elaine White is an accountant advising two couples, the Carsons and Bradleys, regarding their charitable giving options and related tax strategies. The Carsons are an upper-middle class family with $295,000 in income, a moderate amount of deductions, and... View Details

Keywords: Charitable Giving; Tax Accounting; Tax Strategy; Charity; Charitable Lead Trusts; Charitable Remainder Trusts; Public Charities; Foundations; Donor-Advised Funds; Pooled Income Funds; Taxation; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; United States

Purchase

2011
Working Paper

Tax Policy and the Efficiency of U.S. Direct Investment Abroad

By: Mihir A. Desai, C. Fritz Foley and James R. Hines Jr.

Deferral of U.S. taxes on foreign source income is commonly characterized as a subsidy to foreign investment, as reflected in its inclusion among "tax expenditures" and occasional calls for its repeal. This paper analyzes the extent to which tax deferral and other... View Details

Keywords: Cash Flow; Investment Return; Foreign Direct Investment; Investment Funds; Policy; Taxation; United States

02 Jun 2011
Research & Ideas

Signing at the Top: The Key to Preventing Tax Fraud?

the Internal Revenue Service is the federal tax gap, which is the difference between what Americans should pay on their taxes and what they actually do pay. According to the IRS's most recent estimates the... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Accounting

24 Oct 2017
Research & Ideas

Tax Reform is on the Front Burner Again. Here’s Why You Should Care

and deeply the tax system impacts our lives. If you think about poverty, we now try to address it largely through the tax system via the earned income View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

2013
Comment

Fairness and Redistribution: Comment

By: Rafael Di Tella and Juan Dubra

In an influential paper, Alesina and Angeletos (2005)—henceforth, AA—argued that a preference for fairness could lead two identical societies to choose different economic systems. In particular, two equilibria might arise: one with low taxes and a belief that the... View Details

Keywords: Taxes; Beliefs; Economic Systems; Values and Beliefs; Fairness; Taxation

2016
Working Paper

Meet the Oligarchs: Business Legitimacy, State Capacity and Taxation

By: Rafael Di Tella, Juan Dubra and Alejandro Lagomarsino

We analyze the role of people’s beliefs about the rich in the determination of public policy in the context of a randomized online survey experiment. A question we study is the desirability of government-private sector meetings, a variable we argue is connected to... View Details

Keywords: Business Legitimacy; State Capacity; Meetings; Taxes; Top 1%; Regulation; Prejudice and Bias; Values and Beliefs; Taxation; Business and Government Relations

SSRN

Article

How Did the Great Recession Affect Charitable Giving?

By: Arthur C. Brooks

A great deal of research has studied the effects of income and tax changes on charitable giving. However, little work has focused on how these relationships were affected by the Great Recession. This article estimates the tax and income effects using the 2009 Panel... View Details

Keywords: Charitable Giving; Great Recession; Philanthropy; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Financial Crisis; Taxation; Policy

Article

Optimal Taxation in Theory and Practice

By: N. Gregory Mankiw, Matthew C. Weinzierl and Danny Yagan

We highlight and explain eight lessons from optimal tax theory and compare them to the last few decades of OECD tax policy. As recommended by theory, top marginal income tax rates have declined, marginal income tax schedules have flattened, redistribution has risen... View Details

Keywords: Taxation; Theory; Practice; Policy

November 1994 (Revised January 1995)
Background Note

A Note on Capital Cash Flow Valuation

By: Richard S. Ruback

Presents the capital cash flow method for valuing risky cash flows. In this method cash flows are calculated to include the benefits of interest tax shields. In a capital structure, with just ordinary debt and common equity, capital cash flows equal the flows available... View Details

Keywords: Capital; Cash Flow; Valuation