International effects of corporate tax cuts on income distribution

Abstract

AbstractThis paper evaluates the domestic and cross‐country effects of corporate income tax (CIT) cuts on income inequality using a tractable multi‐country DSGE model calibrated to U.S. and Canadian data. We illustrate that the cross‐border propagation of differentiated equity holdings can help explain the increase in income inequality, both within‐ and cross‐country, in response to a CIT cut. A lower barrier to capital mobility alleviates this divergence in income, while lower trade costs exert little effects on income distribution. The model is also consistent with recent evidence that middle‐income workers experience lower income growth than their counterparts in either extreme of the skill spectrum.