Florian Misch

Growth and Welfare Maximization in Models of Public Finance and Endogenous Growth

This paper evaluates the trade-off between growth and welfare maximization from two perspectives. Firstly, it synthesizes and extends endogenous growth models with public finance to compare growth and welfare maximizing tax rates. Secondly, it examines the distinct model outcomes in terms of their growth rates and welfare levels. This comparison highlights the range of trade-offs: the growth maximizing tax rate can be above, below, or equal to the welfare maximizing equivalent. We find however that even relatively large differences in growth and welfare maximizing tax rates translate into relatively small differences in growth rates, and, in some cases, welfare levels.

Re-Assessing the Merits of Measuring Tax Evasions through Surveys: Evidence from Serbian Firms

This paper addresses the major weakness of measuring tax evasion through business and household surveys, namely the reluctance of respondents to answer truthfully due to the threat of disclosure. First, we assess the merits of a novel questioning method to gather information about tax evasion by means of business surveys. This approach allows estimating the prevalence of tax evasion, but it does not allow identifying whether the individual firm engages in tax evasion or not, therefore providing incentives for survey participants to answer truthfully. Second and contrary to most other business surveys, we differentiate between two common modes of tax evasion, namely underreporting of sales and informal supplements to official wages (‘envelope wages’). Using evidence from Serbia, we show that the estimated share of firms which underreport sales and wages, respectively, by at least 10% is higher under the crosswise model compared to the case when conventional questioning methods applied in business surveys such as the World Bank Enterprise Surveys are used. However, the difference is only significant with respect to sales. These results appear to be robust to a number of modifications, and we explore various potential causes that lead to these results.

THE EFFECTS OF PUBLIC SPENDING COMPOSITION ON FIRM PRODUCTIVITY

This paper exploits the unique institutional features of South Africa to estimate the impact of provincial public spending on firm productivity. In contrast to existing microeconomic evidence, we explore the effects of fiscal expenditures and remove the effects of revenue raising policies. Our identification strategy is based on differences in the effects of public spending across firms within the same industry and province. We show that public spending composition affects productivity depending on the capital intensity of firms, with less capital intensive firms being particularly affected. These effects appear to be robust.

What Does Ex-Post Evidence Tell Us About the Output Effects of Future Tax Reforms?

This paper reviews the existing evidence on the effects of tax reforms on output levels and growth over the short and long run from different strands of the literature. It develops and applies criteria to evaluate the usefulness of ex-post estimates to predict the effects of tax reforms ex-ante. These include whether the estimated policy change can be replicated in practice and whether the estimates are reliable. Based on these criteria we present detailed tables summarizing and comparing ex-post estimates of the effects of tax reforms. Overall, our review suggests that at least the direction of the long-run growth effects can be predicted with a reasonable degree of certainty. However, our review also suggests that depending on the tax change, trade-offs between short-run stabilization and long-run growth may arise and that more research on this question is needed.

Fiscal Policy and Growth with Complementarities and Constraints on Government

This paper considers the implications of complementarity in private production and constraints on government for optimal fiscal policy. Using an endogenous growth model with public finance, it derives three central results which modify findings in the literature under standard assumptions. First, it shows that optimal public spending composition and taxation are interrelated so that first- and second-best fiscal policies differ. Second, it shows that the growth-maximizing fiscal policy is affected by preference parameters. Third, it shows that with budget rigidities and informational limitations, knowledge about the optimal fiscal policy parameter values is not necessary for growth-enhancing fiscal policy adjustments.

Binding Constraints and Second-Best Strategies in Endogenous Growth Models with Public Finance

This paper uses an endogenous growth model with public finance to test whether alleviating the most binding constraint to growth corresponds to the optimal fiscal policy adjustment. It makes two contributions: first, it shows that this strategy is optimal if there is only one policy adjustment which alleviates the most binding constraint. When there are several, some of them may in fact reduce growth. The second contribution is therefore to develop a simple guiding principle for this situation: we show that it is likely optimal to adopt the policy adjustment which alleviates the most and worsens the least binding constraint.

A SURVEY ON THE OUTPUT EFFECTS OF TAX REFORMS FROM A POLICY PERSPECTIVE

This study reviews the existing evidence on the effects of tax reforms on output levels and growth over the short and long run from different strands of the literature. It develops and applies criteria to evaluate the usefulness of ex‐post estimates to predict the effects of tax reforms ex ante. Based on these criteria, we present detailed tables summarizing and comparing ex‐post estimates of the effects of tax reforms. Overall, our review suggests that at least the direction of the short‐run and long‐run growth effects can be predicted with a reasonable degree of certainty, but there is disagreement with respect to the magnitude. Our review also suggests that depending on the tax change, trade‐offs between short‐run stabilization and long‐run growth may arise and that more research on this question is needed.

Using Surveys of Business Perceptions as a Guide to Growth-Enhancing Fiscal Reforms

This paper assesses the merits of using business perceptions of growth constraints as a guide to growth-enhancing fiscal policy reforms. Using endogenous growth models in which the government levies an income tax to provide public inputs to the production of private firms, the paper demonstrates that such perceptions of growth constraints may be misleading from a policy perspective. In particular firms can be expected to systematically overestimate the growth-enhancing effects of lower tax rates relative to public services and public capital, and underestimate the growth-enhancing effects of greater provision of public capital relative to taxation and public services. In addition, we show that firms rank different public services and different types of public capital according to the actual costs they impose on firms. It is then shown that these theoretical predictions regarding how firms rank constraints correspond closely to the observed ranking of constraints by firms in the World Bank’s Enterprise Surveys.