Who has really paid for the Reconstruction of East Germany? Expected and Realized Returns on Real Estate Investments in East and West Germany in the 1990s

This paper explores cultural differences in risky choices between Australian and German students. The purpose of this paper is to challenge the wide-spread view that investment in residential property in East Germany after unification has turned out to be a financial disaster in most cases by calculating (1) the after-tax return an investor in real property might have expected at the beginning of the 1990s and (2) the after-tax return that has been realized ten years after. We compare investments by a high-income investor resident in Germany in an average individually-owned flat in three major cities in East Germany and two cities in West Germany. The result of our study is that tax subsidies have protected investors from loosing money in a real estate investment. Therefore, it was indeed the taxpayers not the investors who have borne the cost of reconstructing East Germany. But taxpayers have spent a lot more on subsidising the much bigger West German housing market where property prices and tax subsidies per average investment were much higher.real-estate investment, after-tax return on investment, tax subsidies, Assisted Area Law (Fördergebietsgesetz), empirical study, income tax reduction, loss offset, special depreciation, return on equity capital (ROE), property prices

Neutral and Equitable Taxation of Pensions as Capital Income

We derive an ex post neutral comprehensive income tax on pension schemes equivalent to a Johansson-Samuelson tax that guarantees non-discriminatory treatment of lifetime-dependent and other investments. By separately taxing contributions and benefits, our concept does not require any assumptions on the return of a pension scheme and, therefore, is of special interest for taxing public PAYGO schemes. Assuming constant tax and interest rates, the system is characterized by constant fractions of deductible contributions and taxable pensions. The tax base from neutral pension taxation considerably exceeds the one under existing legislation, e.g. in Germany or in the U.S.

The perception of income taxation on risky investments: An experimental analysis of different methods of loss compensation

We analyze the effect of income taxation with limited loss deduction on investment decisions. An experiment with five treatments was conducted, one without taxation as a reference and four with taxation and limited loss compensation. The participants' task was to repeatedly choose one out of two risky investment opportunities. Earnings from the experiment depended on the payoffs of the participant's investments. Our results reveal that subjects do not only look at gross payoffs but also take taxes into account in their decisions. The experimental setup made sure that a rational participant who correctly perceives the effect of the different loss offset rules would take exactly the same decisions with and without taxation. Nevertheless, we find out that individuals tend to overestimate the value of loss compensation rules which offer less than a complete loss offset. --

Who has really paid for the Reconstruction of East Germany? Expected and Realized Returns on Real Estate Investments in East and West Germany in the 1990s

The purpose of this paper is to challenge the wide-spread view that investment in residential property in East Germany after unification has turned out to be a financial disaster in most cases by calculating (1) the after-tax return an investor in real property might have expected at the beginning of the 1990s and (2) the after-tax return that has been realized ten years after. We compare investments by a high-income investor resident in Germany in an average individually-owned flat in three major cities in East Germany and two cities in West Germany. The result of our study is that tax subsidies have protected investors from loosing money in a real estate investment. Therefore, it was indeed the taxpayers not the investors who have borne the cost of reconstructing East Germany. But taxpayers have spent a lot more on subsidising the much bigger West German housing market where property prices and tax subsidies per average investment were much higher

Wirkungen einer Abgeltungssteuer auf Investitionsentscheidungen und Kapitalstruktur von Unternehmen

Die isolierte Einführung einer Abgeltungssteuer hat erhebliche Änderungen der Rahmendaten für alle Investitions- und Finanzierungsentscheidungen im Inland ansässiger Investoren in Personenunternehmen und Kapitalgesellschaften zur Folge. Durch eine abgeltend besteuerte Anlagealternative wird eine zum persönlichen Grenzsteuersatz besteuerte, eigenfinanzierte gewerbliche Investition relativ unattraktiver, woraus sich Konsequenzen für die Investitionsund Finanzierungsstruktur des Unternehmenssektors ergeben können. Dieser Beitrag analysiert mögliche Auswirkungen einer Abgeltungssteuer auf unternehmerische Entscheidungen im Kontext der deutschen Einkommen- und Körperschaftsteuer nach der aktuellen Rechtslage (Abschnitte 2 und 3). Daran anschließend werden Vorschläge für flankierende Veränderungen der Unternehmensbesteuerung entwickelt, durch die unerwünschte Effekte der Abgeltungssteuer auf Finanzierungsentscheidungen vermieden werden (Abschnitt 4). Insbesondere wird gezeigt, dass dies auch ohne eine allgemeine Senkung der Steuerbelastung auf unternehmerische Gewinne auf das Niveau der Abgeltungssteuer möglich ist. Die Untersuchung erfolgt anhand von Entscheidungskalkülen eines unbeschränkt ESt-pflichtigen Investors für ausgewählte Investitions- und Finanzierungsentscheidungen. --

The tax advantages of life insurance policies

This paper carries out an analysis of individual profitability of life insurance in form of endowment policies which have been very popular in Germany for several decades. We integrate taxes, transaction costs and the possibility of early termination into a model of capital budgeting. The aim of this paper is to model the benefits of endowment policies as a form of saving. In a first step a riskless world with full foresight and a therefore deterministic investment horizon is assumed. After this, the occurrence of a random liquidity need and thus a stochastic investment horizon is analyzed. We discuss different benchmarks and decision criteria to reflect the individual advantages of the endowment insurance as well as the extent of their special tax treatment compared to alternative investments.Vorteilhaftigkeitsanalyse für Kapitallebensversicherungen; stochastischer Anlagehorizont; steuerliche Sonderbehandlung

Contributions and pension payments in a decision-neutral income tax

This paper discusses how payments from and contributions to a life annuity or a pension scheme can be taxed decision neutrally in the context of a classical income tax. We use the concept of "economic income" in the sense of Johansson and Samuelson. Within the framework of an economic analysis life annuities and pension schemes can be treated as investments. Under an ideal neutral income tax, the decision to make such lifetime-dependent investments should not be distorted by taxation. Ideally, taxation should not distort the decision between lifetime-dependent and other investments. The specificity of the approach adopted herein is that neutrality of taxation holds ex ante and also ex post if the amount of pension claims is not yet known during the accumulation period, as it is the case with the pay-as-you-go public pension scheme in Germany and many other countries.Entscheidungsneutrale Besteuerung; ökonomischer Gewinn

Was kostet eine finanzierungsneutrale Besteuerung von Kapitalgesellschaften?

Die Besteuerung von Kapitaleinkommen im deutschen Ertragsteuerrecht erfolgt nicht finanzierungsneutral. Der Sachverständigenrat zur Begutachtung der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Entwicklung hatte im Vorfeld der Unternehmensteuerreform 2008/09 ein finanzierungsneutrales Körperschaftsteuersystem vorgeschlagen, das jedoch nicht umgesetzt wurde, da befürchtet wurde, dass die politische Zielvorgabe geringer Steuerausfälle nicht eingehalten worden wäre. Wir untersuchen in diesem Beitrag dieZinsbereinigung des Grundkapitals, eine Reformalternative, die ebenso Finanzierungsneutralität sichert, im Hinblick auf die zu erwartenden Steuerausfälle. Hierfür verwenden wir die Körperschaftsteuerstatistik des Statistischen Bundesamtes. Wir stellen fest, dass die Steuerausfälle verhältnismäßig gering sind. -- Capital income taxation in Germany distorts financing decisions of corporations as the after-tax cost of capital for equity is considerably higher than for debt. Since 2006 the German Council of Economic Experts has been proposing a neutral tax system similar to the Norwegian shareholder ACE tax. In the last German corporate and personal income tax reform in 2008/09 this proposal has not been realized because revenue losses were expected to be unacceptably high. In this paper we estimate the expected tax revenue losses of an alternative concept which also ensures neutrality with respect to financing decisions: a notional interest deduction on nominal capital and capital reserve. Data from the official German corporate income tax statistics are used. We show that revenue losses are relatively small.