Is Cutting the GST the Best Approach?

The government of Canada has reduced the Goods and Services Tax (GST) rate by 2-percentage points over the past several years. This tax measure seems to be welcomed by the public and some public policy observers; however, it is also associated with certain economic and social costs. This paper aims to assess the rightness of the GST reduction. To that end, the paper summarizes research findings regarding economic costs and levels of distortion associated with alternate tax measures. The paper also contrasts Canada’s reliance on consumption taxes with general trends prevailing in other industrialized countries. The analysis shows that taxing consumption is one of the most economically effective methods of generating government revenues, whereas the reduction of consumption taxes yields the least optimal economic pay-off compared to other tax measures. The growing importance of value-added taxation is the clearest tax policy trend in the OECD countries, whereas reducing the GST rate will further diminish the importance of consumption taxes in Canada with no noticeable dollar value savings for households.consumption taxes, GST, Goods and Services Tax, composition of government revenue

2차원 2단계 배낭문제에 대한 정수계획모형 및 최적해법

학위논문 (석사) -- 서울대학교 대학원 : 공과대학 산업공학과, 2021. 2. 이경식.In this thesis, we study integer programming models and exact algorithms for the two-dimensional two-staged knapsack problems, which maximizes the profit by cutting a single rectangular plate into smaller rectangular items by two-staged guillotine cuts. We first introduce various integer programming models, including the strip-packing model, the staged-pattern model, the level-packing model, and the arc-flow model for the problem. Then, a hierarchy of the strength of the upper bounds provided by the LP-relaxations of the models is established based on theoretical analysis. We also show that there exists a polynomial-size model that has not been proven yet as far as we know. Exact methods, including branch-and-price algorithms using the strip-packing model and the staged-pattern model, are also devised. Computational experiments on benchmark instances are conducted to examine the strength of upper bounds obtained by the LP-relaxations of the models and evaluate the performance of exact methods. The results show that the staged-pattern model gives a competitive theoretical and computational performance.본 논문은 2단계 길로틴 절단(two-staged guillotine cut)을 사용하여 이윤을 최대화하는 2차원 2단계 배낭 문제(two-dimensional two-staged knapsack problem: 이하 2TDK)에 대한 정수최적화 모형과 최적해법을 다룬다. 우선, 본 연구에서는 스트립패킹모형, 단계패턴모형, 레벨패킹모형, 그리고 호-흐름모형과 같은 정수최적화 모형들을 소개한다. 그 뒤, 각각의 모형의 선형계획완화문제에 대해 상한강도를 이론적으로 분석하여 상한강도 관점에서 모형들 간 위계를 정립한다. 또한, 본 연구에서는 2TDK의 다항크기(polynomial-size) 모형의 존재성을 처음으로 증명한다. 다음으로 본 연구는 2TDK의 최적해를 구하는 알고리즘으로써 패턴기반모형들에 대한 분지평가 알고리즘과 레벨패킹모형을 기반으로 한 분지절단 알고리즘을 제안한다. 단계패턴모형이 이론적으로도 가장 좋은 상한강도를 보장할 뿐만 아니라, 계산 분석을 통해 단계패턴모형을 기반으로 한 분지평가 알고리즘이 제한된 시간 내 좋은 품질의 가능해를 찾음을 확인하였다.Abstract i Contents iv List of Tables vi List of Figures vii Chapter 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Problem Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 1.2 Literature Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 1.3 Contributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 1.4 Organization of the Thesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Chapter 2 Integer Programming Models for 2TDK 9 2.1 Pattern-based Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 2.2 Arc-flow Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 2.3 Level Packing Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Chapter 3 Theoretical Analysis of Integer Programming Models 20 3.1 Upper Bounds of AF and SM(1;1) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 3.2 Upper Bounds of ML, PM(d), and SM(d; d) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 3.3 Polynomial-size Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 Chapter 4 Exact Methods 33 4.1 Branch-and-price Algorithm for the Strip Packing Model . . . . . . . 34 4.2 Branch-and-price Algorithm for the Staged-pattern Model . . . . . . 39 4.2.1 The Standard Scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 4.2.2 The Height-aggregated Scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 4.3 Branch-and-cut Algorithm for the Modified Level Packing Model . . 44 Chapter 5 Computational Experiments 46 5.1 Instances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 5.2 Upper Bounds Comparison . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 5.2.1 A Group of Small Instances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 5.2.2 A Group of Large Instances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 5.2.3 Class 5 Instances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 5.3 Solving Instances to Optimality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 5.3.1 A Group of Small Instances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 5.3.2 A Group of Large Instances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69 5.3.3 Class 5 Instances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 Chapter 6 Conclusion 77 Bibliography 79 국문초록 83Maste

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