Accounting for family background when designing optimal income taxes: a microeconometric simulation analysis

The original publication is available at www.springer.comThe purpose of this paper is to introduce and adopt a generalised version of Roemer's (1998) Equality of Opportunity (EOp) framework, which we call extended EOp, for analysing second-best optimal income taxation. Unlike the pure EOp criterion of Roemer (1998) the extended EOp criterion allows for alternative weighting profiles in the treatment of income differentials between as well as within types when types are defined by circumstances that are beyond people's control. This study uses parental education as a measure of exogenous circumstances. An empirical microeconometric model of labour supply in Italy is employed to simulate and identify income tax-transfer rules that are optimal according to the extended EOp criterion. We look for second-best optimality, i.e. the tax-transfer rules are not allowed to depend on family background, they only depend on income: family background is taken indirectly into account. The rules are defined by a universal (not individualized) lump-sum transfer (positive or negative) and by one or two marginal tax rates. A rather striking result of the analysis is that the optimal tax-transfer rule turns out to be a universal lump-sum tax (with marginal tax rates equal to zero), under Roemer's pure EOp criterion as well as under the generalised EOp criterion with moderate degrees of aversion to within-type inequality. A higher degree of within-type inequality aversion instead produces EOp-optimal rules with positive marginal tax rates. When the EOp-version of the Gini welfare function is adopted, the optimal tax rule turns out to be close to the actual 1993 Italian tax system, if not for the important difference of prescribing a universal lump-sum positive transfer of 3,500,000 ITL (= 1807 Euros), which has no comparable counterpart in the actual system. On the other hand, when using the conventional equality of outcome (EO) criterion, the pure lump-sum tax always turns out to be optimal, at least with respect to the classes of two- and three-parameter rules. We also compute optimal rules under the additional constraint that universal lump-sum taxes are not feasible. Overall, the results do not conform to the perhaps common expectation that the EO criterion is more supportive of “interventionist” (redistributive) policies than an extended EOp approach. Key words: Equality of opportunity, equality of outcome, labour supply, optimal income taxatio

Food distribution influences social organization and population growth in a small rodent

This is the postprint version of the article. The published article can be located at the publisher's websiteIn polygynous mammals, the spatial clumping and predictability of food should influence spacing behavior of females whose reproductive success depends to a great extent on food availability, which would in turn affect male spacing behavior. Changes in the social and mating systems can then influence individual fitness and population dynamics. To test these hypotheses, we manipulated food distribution and predictability in enclosed populations of bank voles (Myodes glareolus) and monitored spacing behavior, survival, and reproduction of adult females and males over 3 months. Food was either spread out (dispersed treatment), spatially clumped and highly predictable (clumped treatment) or spatially clumped but less predictable (variable treatment). We found that females in the clumped treatment were more aggregated and had more overlapping home ranges compared with females in the dispersed and variable treatments. Male spacing behavior followed the same patterns. Despite different social organizations between treatments, no differences in home range size and mating systems were found in females and males. In addition, we found that females in the clumped food treatment had a higher probability of successfully producing weaned offspring, likely due to lower infanticide rates. This led to higher population growth compared with the other 2 treatments. These results suggest a tight relationship between the spatiotemporal distribution of food, social organization, and population dynamics.2014-04-3

Inhibitory Spillover: Increased Urination Urgency Facilitates Impulse Control in Unrelated Domains

This is the authors’ final, accepted and refereed manuscript to the articleVisceral states are known to reduce the ability to exert self-control. In the current research, we investigated how self-control is affected by a visceral factor associated with inhibition rather than with approach: bladder control. We designed four studies to test the hypothesis that inhibitory signals are not domain-specific but can spill over to unrelated domains, resulting in increased impulse control in the behavioral domain. In Study 1, participants’ urination urgency correlated with performance on color-naming but not word-meaning trials of a Stroop task. In Studies 2 and 3, we found that higher levels of bladder pressure resulted in an increased ability to resist impulsive choices in monetary decision making. We found that inhibitory spillover effects are moderated by sensitivity of the Behavioral Inhibition System (Study 3) and can be induced by exogenous cues (Study 4). Implications for inhibition and impulse-control theories are discussed

A missing link in the chain of care?

SK 152, våren 2010Problemstilling: På kva måte kan dagtilbod vere viktig for heimebuande personar med demens? Mange stadar blir dagtilbod omtala som eit manglande leddet i omsorgskjeda. Denne litterære oppgåva prøvar å belyse korleis dagaktivitetstilbod kan vere viktig for heimebuande personar med demens. Talet på eldre mennesker er aukande og fleire får demens. I dag er det om lag 70 000 personar med demens i Norge, og minst halvparten av desse bur i eigen heim. Det å tilrettelegge for at personar med demens kan få bu heime lengst mogeleg er ei politisk målsetting, og dagtilbod kan i denne samanheng vere eit viktig supplement. Undersøkingar visar at dagtilbod er eit godt tilbod til personar med demens, samstundes som det kan verke avlastande for pårørande og dermed vere med på å utsette innlegging i institusjon. Dagtilbod som er spesialt tilrettelagt for heimebuande personar med demens er lite utbygd i Norge, kun tretti prosent av alle norske kommunar har slike tilbod. Det er naudsynt med ei betydeleg satsing på dagtilbod i åra framover for å møte behovet for behandlingstilbod utanfor institusjon. Av Demensplanen går det fram at alle kommunane i landet bør kunne tilby eit tilrettelagt dagaktivitetstilbod for personar med demens innan 2015. Eit godt tilrettelagt dagsentertilbod kan vere av stort betydning for at personar med demens og deira familiar skal oppleve kvardagen som trygg og meiningsfull

Prøveløslatelse fra forvaring med vilkår om opphold I institusjon eller kommunal boenhet utover ettårsfristen – ikke bare noen, men mange problemstillinger

Suplemento esporádico

Tokter 1958

Fra Årsberetning vedkommende Norges Fiskerier 1959 - Nr.

Ecodesign education and activities at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology

Numeración errónea en el original