Capital Income Taxation with Work Incentives

Abstract

This paper uses a life-cycle model of heterogeneous agents to study a capital income tax that rewards hard work. We propose a simple mechanism of capital taxation which is negatively correlated with labor supply. It provides a strong work incentive when households possess large assets and high productivity later in the life-cycle, when they otherwise would reduce labor supply. With the ex-post higher after-tax return from assets, the system also adds to the saving motive and all the aggregate variables including capital, labor and consumption will rise. The higher capital-labor ratio increases the wage rate, which benefits households with fewer assets. The increased economic activities expands the tax base and the revenue neutral reform results in the lower average tax rate. The system improves long-run welfare and the majority of current generations would support a transition to the reformed system.