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Full-Text Articles in Law

State Fiscal Policies And Transitory Income Fluctuations, James R. Hines Jr. Sep 2010

State Fiscal Policies And Transitory Income Fluctuations, James R. Hines Jr.

Articles

State and local expenditure and tax revenue respond less to the business cycle than do federal spending and revenue, thereby reducing the countercyclicality of total government expenditure and revenue. This paper considers forces responsible for the cyclical pattern of state expenditure and revenue. Annual fluctuations in state personal income are associated with small changes in state spending and significant changes in tax receipts; receipt of federal grants is associated with greater state spending. Tax collections, and to a lesser degree expenditure, of larger states are more closely associated with annual income fluctuations than are the tax collections and expenditure of …


Reply To Becker And Fuest, James R. Hines Jr. Jan 2010

Reply To Becker And Fuest, James R. Hines Jr.

Articles

It is an understatement to say that the appropriate taxation of foreign business income is a controversial and potentially confusing topic. One of the mysteries of international taxation has been that the prescriptions of what, until recently, was the accepted academic wisdom differs so sharply from widespread international practice. In an important contribution, Richman (1963) noted that a home government confronted with the choice of where it would prefer one of its resident taxpayers to allocate a single unit of capital would weigh the after-foreign-tax return from investing abroad against the pre-tax return from investing at home. From this observation, …


The Last Best Hope For Progressivity In Tax, E. J. Mccaffery, James R. Hines Jr. Jan 2010

The Last Best Hope For Progressivity In Tax, E. J. Mccaffery, James R. Hines Jr.

Articles

We argue that a spending tax, as opposed to an income or wage tax, is the “last best hope” for a return to significantly more progressive marginal tax rates than obtain today. The simple explanation for this central claim looks to incentive effects, especially for “rich people,” as both economists and commentators are inclined to focus. High marginal tax rates under an income tax fall on and hence deter the socially productive activities of work and savings. High marginal rates under a wage tax fall on and hence deter the socially productive activity of work alone. But high marginal rates …


Coordinating Sanctions In Torts, Kyle D. Logue Jan 2010

Coordinating Sanctions In Torts, Kyle D. Logue

Articles

This Article begins with the standard Law and Economics account of tort law as a regulatory tool or system of deterrence, that is, as a means of giving regulated parties the optimal ex ante incentives to minimize the costs of accidents. Building on this fairly standard (albeit not universally accepted) picture of tort law, the Article asks the question how tort law should adjust, if at all, to coordinate with already existing non-tort systems of regulation. Thus, if a particular activity is already subject to extensive agency-based regulation (whether in the form of command-and-control requirements or in the form of …


Of Coase, Calabresi, And Optimal Tax Liability, Kyle D. Logue, Joel Slemrod Jan 2010

Of Coase, Calabresi, And Optimal Tax Liability, Kyle D. Logue, Joel Slemrod

Articles

The Article proceeds as follows. Part II offers a primer on the Coase Theorem, beginning with the classic case of neighbor externalizing on neighbor (farmer and rancher), and it explains the basic invariance propositions. Part III shifts the focus to Coasean situations involving buyers and sellers in a market or contractual relationship, buyers and sellers whose market interactions cause harm to third parties. Using supply-and-demand diagrams, we illustrate (in a new way) some of the most basic findings of the economic analysis of law, including both the Coasean invariance and efficiency propositions and the Calabresian least-cost avoider idea. Also in …


The Attack On Nonprofit Status: A Charitable Assessment, James R. Hines Jr., Jill R. Horwitz, Austin Nichols Jan 2010

The Attack On Nonprofit Status: A Charitable Assessment, James R. Hines Jr., Jill R. Horwitz, Austin Nichols

Articles

American nonprofit organizations receive favorable tax treatment, including tax exemptions and tax-deductibility of contributions, in return for their devotion to charitable purposes and restrictions not to distribute profits. Recent efforts to extend some or all of these tax benefits to for-profit companies making social investments, including the creation of the new hybrid nonprofit/for-profit company form known as the Low-Profit Limited Liability Company, threaten to undermine the vitality of the nonprofit sector and the integrity of the tax system. Reform advocates maintain that the ability to compensate executives based on performance and to distribute profits when attractive investment opportunities are scarce …


Treasure Islands, James R. Hines Jr. Jan 2010

Treasure Islands, James R. Hines Jr.

Articles

In movies and novels, tax havens are often settings for shady international deals; in practice, they are rather less flashy. Tax havens are countries and territories that offer low tax rates and favorable regulatory policies to foreign investors. For example, tax havens typically tax inbound investment at zero or very low rates and further encourage investment with telecommunications and transportation facilities, other business infrastructure, favorable legal environments, and limited bureaucratic hurdles to starting new firms. Tax havens are small: most are islands; all but a few have populations below one million; and they have above-average incomes. Tax havens are also …


Law And The Social Control Of American Capitalism, William J. Novak Jan 2010

Law And The Social Control Of American Capitalism, William J. Novak

Articles

This Essay is part of a larger, ongoing investigation of the role of law in the creation of a modern American state from 1877 to 1932. That project charts the decline of an early nineteenth-century world of local, common law self government (what I called in a previous work a “well-regulated society”) and the rise of a distinctly modern administrative regulatory state in the United States. This new legal-political regime was rooted in three interlinked developments: the centralization of public power; the individualization of private right; and the constitutionalization of the rule of law. Beginning soon after the Civil War, …