Partisanship and taxation: An exploratory study of crisis responses

With the outbreak of the financial crisis in 2008, European governments extensively intervened to avert a severe economic recession. Taxation is a crucial instrument to achieve such economic objectives, but it also represents a redistributive tool in democratic societies. Generally, left-wing parties are more supportive of progressive taxes and redistribution than right-wing governments. As a crisis response, one could assume that European governments, especially social-democrats, reinforced a redistributive stance to compensate for the substantial amounts of public money used to bail-out financial institutions. Yet, the internationalisation of capital markets has made it difficult to levy high income taxes as it might cause capital flights, less investments and growth. Based on the tax reforms introduced between 2008 and 2010, the paper explores how European governments mitigated the fiscal stress from the crisis. The findings show that fiscal pressures significantly restrained the policy choices available to governments. -- Mit dem Ausbruch der Wirtschafts- und Finanzkrise in 2008, verabschiedeten die Europäischen Regierungen vielfältige Maßnahmen, um eine langfristige Rezession zu verhindern. Steuern sind ein wichtiges Instrument, um solche wirtschaftspolitischen Zielen zu erreichen, jedoch stellen sie auch ein wichtiges Umverteilungsmittel in demokratischen Gesellschaften dar. Für gewöhnlich sind Parteien des linken Spektrums größere Befürworter von umverteilungspolitischen Maßnahmen und von progressiven Steuern als konservative und liberale Parteien. Als Antwort auf die Krise könnte man somit erwarten, dass Europäische Regierungen, vorzugsweise linke, umverteilungspolitische Maßnahmen verabschieden, besonders da große Mengen an Steuergeldern benötigt wurden, um für finanzielle Institutionen einen Rettungsschirm bereit zu stellen. Die Liberalisierung der Kapitalmärkte erschwert es jedoch, hohe Kapitalsteuern zu erheben, da befürchtet wird, dass dies eine Kapitalflucht, weniger Investitionen und Wachstum zur Folge haben könnte. Anhand der Steuerpolitik, die zwischen 2008 und 2010 eingeführt wurde, geht das Arbeitspapier der Frage nach, mit welchen Reformen Europäische Regierungen den Krisendruck bewältigt haben. Die empirischen Ergebnisse zeigen, dass fiskalpolitischer Druck den politischen Handlungsspielraum von Regierungen erheblich einschränkt.crisis,fiscal stress,economic growth,tax policy,political parties,European Union

The 'European social model' under pressure

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Dictators Don’t Compete: Autocracy, Democracy, and Tax Competition. CES Open Forum Series #22 2018-2019

It pays to be a tax haven. Ireland has become rich that way. Why do not all countries follow the Irish example, cut their capital taxes and get wealthy? One reason is structural. As the economic standard model of tax competition explains, small countries gain from competitive tax cuts while large countries suffer. Yet not all small (large) countries have low (high) capital taxes. Why? The reason, we argue, is political. While the economic standard model implicitly assumes competing governments to be democratic, more than a third of countries world-wide are non-democratic. We explain theoretically why autocracies are less likely to adjust to competitive constraints and test our argument empirically against data on the corporate tax policy of 99 countries from 1999 to 2011. Our findings shed light on how domestic institutions and global markets interact in economic policy making

Partisanship and taxation : an exploratory study of crisis responses

With the outbreak of the financial crisis in 2008, European governments extensively intervened to avert a severe economic recession. Taxation is a crucial instrument to achieve such economic objectives, but it also represents a redistributive tool in democratic societies. Generally, left-wing parties are more supportive of progressive taxes and redistribution than right-wing governments. As a crisis response, one could assume that European governments, especially social-democrats, reinforced a redistributive stance to compensate for the substantial amounts of public money used to bail-out financial institutions. Yet, the internationalisation of capital markets has made it difficult to levy high income taxes as it might cause capital flights, less investments and growth. Based on the tax reforms introduced between 2008 and 2010, the paper explores how European governments mitigated the fiscal stress from the crisis. The findings show that fiscal pressures significantly restrained the policy choices available to governments

Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis of Dynamic Cavernosographies in Erectile Dysfunction due to Venous Leakage

Of 521 patients with erectile dysfunction in whom a multidisciplinary approach was used, 145 (27.8%) showed venous leakage as (concomitant) etiology of the impotence in dynamic cavernosography. The rate of the maintenance flow corresponded well with the response to a standardized intracavernosal injection of vasoactive drugs (p < 0.05) in patients with venous leakage. The maintenance flow increased with the age in secondary impotent men. It was not statistically different in patients with or without concomitant arterial insufficiency (p = 0.19). Fifty-one of 145 patients (32.2%) presented a pathologic cavernosal drainage via a single venous system; 94/145 (64.8%) showed a combined venous leakage. The type of leakage corresponded neither to the maintenance flow nor to the response to intracavernosal injections. Our findings show that standardized intracavernosal testing and Doppler have a high predictive value for the status of the venous occlusive system. Exact evaluation of the type of leakage can be made by bidimensional cavernosography only

Erectile dysfunction due to ectopic penile vein

A total of 86/260 patients with erectile dysfunction had venous leakage as (joint) etiology. In 5 of 86 patients cavernosography showed pathologic cavernosal drainage only via an ectopic penile vein into the femoral vein. After ligation of this pathologic draining vessel, 4 of 5 patients regained spontaneous erectability. One patient with pathologic bulbocavernosus reflex latencies needed intracavernosal injection of vasoactive drugs for full rigidity

Tax competition and inequality

The baseline model of international tax competition predicts that domestic income inequality will increase: in the worst case progressive taxation on capital is no longer possible and spending levels deteriorate. Given that the median voter is receiving her income mostly from labor, many observers are puzzled that corporate tax competition persists among developed democracies. Even during the economic crisis, hard-hit countries such as Ireland insisted to keep their low corporate tax rate despite pressure from other European countries and with a broad backing of the whole political spectrum. Why do left-wing parties not intervene and call for international tax harmonization if tax competition is detrimental for the poor? It is the aim of this paper to explain the driving forces of tax competition and their consequences on inequality. Specifically, we shed light on why the poor and their representatives in smaller economies have not done much against tax competition. To do so we first build a theoretical model based on asymmetric tax competition in two countries, which we then test empirically. In our model the median voter in both countries is poor; thus the left determines the domestic capital tax rate. Nevertheless, in equilibrium tax competition persists. We show that the rich and the poor of the small country can achieve a higher net income when engaging in international tax competition. This explains why tax competition is politically robust even in a model where the rich have no power over the tax rate. We test the empirical implications of our model against a sample of eight OECD countries and their tax policies over a long time frame from 1960 until today. In conclusion, we discuss the crucial implication from accepting a lower capital tax rate, namely increased domestic and international income inequality

Outstanding University Lecturers: Ambitious Altruists or Mavericks of the Academy?

The paper discusses the results of a research study to determine what characteristics outstanding university lecturers have in common. Academic staff and graduate students at an Australian university were invited to participate in a survey questionnaire followed by voluntary interviews. Lecturers who had been identified as outstanding were also interviewed. The five characteristics were expertise, holistic approach to learning, engaging the student, open door policy and ambitious altruists. This study found that outstanding lecturers were unconventional in their work practices and valued student learning often at the sacrifice of their own career paths. Outstanding university lecturers are ambitious altruists who are working in an increasingly bureaucratized system