The more interesting fight is going on within economics. For a generation, the profession smessage on capital taxes has been simple: the lower the better. Most economists wouldprefer no tax on capital income at all. This seeming fanaticism is rooted in sensible models,developed in the 1970s and 1980s and built on a pleasing simplicity. Taxation inevitablyinvolves trade-offs. Governments tax in order to fund public goods and limit inequality, buttaxes are no free lunch. People and businesses responda tax on carrots, say, reducescarrot consumptionand these responses distort the economy and may reduce its potentialgrowth rate.
经济学内部发生了更有趣的争执。一代以来,经济学家对于资本税的看法十分简单:税率越低越好。大多数经济学家根本不支持对资本收入征税。这种表面上的狂热植根于一些实用模型,它们于20世纪70年代到80年代发展起来,其基本特征是简洁,因此令人愉悦。税收不可避免地涉及了交换。政府征税是为了提供公共产品和限制收入不公,然而税收并非免费的午餐。个人和企业会提供反响,例如,对胡萝卜征税会减少胡萝卜的消费量,而这些反应使得经济扭曲,并有可能减少经济的潜在增长率。
In these models, inequality was seen as a problem of pay differences, best addressedthrough taxes on labour incomes. Taxes on capital were reckoned to have large costs.Capital, or savings invested in new production, raises future growth and consumption. If a taxon capital income discourages investment, that impact compounds indefinitely into thefuture. As a result, zero tax on capital income should be preferred, even by individuals whodon t earn any such income. Economists became vocal in calling for reduced tax rates, andpolicymakers responded. Top capital-income tax rates in America and Britain fell by morethan half from the 1950s to the 1980s. There is pressure to go further.
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