Publications

Are Tax Expenditures a Good Way to Redistribute?

| 1 July 2016
Fiscal, Blog | Tags: Inequality, Tax Expenditures, Taxes
Since 2007, governments across several European countries have implemented cuts to their social programs in an attempt to tackle the fiscal deficits generated by the last economic and financial crisis. At the same time, they have increasingly made use of various tax related measures to ... continue reading

Central Banking and Inequality – Taking Off the Blinders

, and | 16 June 2016
Monetary, Blog | Tags: Central Banks, Ethics, Inequality
Since the financial crisis, the relative importance of monetary policy in the toolbox of macroeconomic policies has increased. In parallel, we have seen a renewed social and political concern with rising inequalities in income and wealth. However, the two trends are rarely connected.[1] Despite studies ... continue reading

Measuring and Understanding Trade in Service Tasks

, and | 24 May 2016
Trade, Discussion Notes | Tags: Employment, Services Trade
Improvements in Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) have had differential impacts on the costs of offshoring service tasks. As a result, services with stronger tradability characteristics are at a higher risk of being offshored. This has increased the need for coming up with proper measures ... continue reading

Energy Subsidies – Widespread, Significant, and Largely Not Reaching the Poor

| 18 April 2016
Fiscal, Blog | Tags: Energy, Inequality, Subsidies
Energy subsidies are widespread and significant. In 2014, according to the IEA (2015), government support for global fossil fuel consumption amounted to 490 billion US$. An IMF working paper (Coady et al., 2015) reports even higher numbers. Distinguishing between subsidies before (pre) and after (post) ... continue reading

Multinational tax avoidance in developing countries

, and | 7 April 2016
Fiscal, Blog | Tags: Corporate Taxes, Development, Tax Avoidance
In recent years many global firms—including Starbucks, Google, and Amazon—have come under fire for avoiding paying taxes in one country by shifting their profits to a country with lower tax rates. ... continue reading