Optimal taxation and intergovernmental transfer in a dynamic model with multiple levels of government

Abstract

In this paper, we study the optimal choices of the federal income tax, federal transfers, and local taxes in a dynamic model of capital accumulation and with explicit game structures among multiple private agents, multiple local governments, and the federal government. In general, the optimal local property tax is zero if the local property tax is constrained to be nonnegative, whereas the optimal local consumption tax is always positive. When the local consumption tax is chosen optimally, the federal income tax can be either positive or negative. For most reasonable parameter values, our numerical calculations have shown that with a positive local consumption tax there exists a reverse transfer from local governments to the federal government.