Tax Support Research Articles

Public Support for Transportation Sales Taxes in California: A Two County Assessment

DOI 10.1515/cjpp-2012-0009 Calif. J. Politics Policy 2013; 5(4): 645–670 Andrew D. Green*, Max Neiman, Shel Bockman and Barbara Sirotnik Public Support for Transportation Sales Taxes in California: A Two County Assessment Abstract: Voters in California counties have been asked to approve transporta- tion sales taxes on over 75 different occasions, and according to the Legislative Analyst, revenues from local option transportation sales taxes accounted for 15% of all revenues raised statewide for transportation during fiscal year 2005/2006. While many analyses examining public support for such taxes have been under- taken using aggregate-level data, little work has been done examining the indi- vidual decision to support a transportation sales tax at the polls. In this paper, we argue that an individual’s propensity to approve or deny a sales tax extension for transportation purposes is a function of a set of attitudinal and self-interest factors. Using a two-county survey, we find that opposition to the renewal of the existing sales tax is centered among anti-tax, political conservative residents who do not trust elected officials. Furthermore, we find that while the two counties border one another, the impact of the attitudinal and self-interest factors in the model vary significantly by county. The findings are important for transportation practitioners who face future transportation sales tax elections, and for politi- cal scientists who are attempting to develop a generalizable set of factors which explain public support for transportation sales taxes. Keywords: county; elections; sales tax; transportation. *Corresponding author: Andrew D. Green, Central College, Political Science, Campus Box #0101, 812 University Pella, Iowa 50219, USA, Tel.: +641-628-5259, e-mail: greena@central.edu Max Neiman: Institute of Governmental Studies, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA Shel Bockman and Barbara Sirotnik: Institute of Applied Research & Policy Analysis, California State University, San Bernardino, CA, USA 1 Introduction Over a decade ago a coalition of highway-oriented interests referred to Califor- nia’s roads and freeways in the following way: California, which once had the best highway system in the country, now ranks near the bottom nationally, as investment in the state’s transportation infrastructure has failed to keep pace with population growth and burgeoning vehicle travel. (Transportation California 1999: p. 3)

Political Ideals and Beliefs About the Distribution of Wealth and Income: A Cross-Cultural Survey of University Students

A survey of comparable groups of undergraduates at Stanford University (USA) in 1996 and 1998, and at Koc University (Turkey) in 1998, reveals some interesting beliefs concerning the distribution of wealth and income. When asked to specify both ideal and real percentage distributions, respondents at the two universities indicate that both income and wealth are much more concentrated in their respective countries than they should be. However, respondents in both countries show virtually no awareness of the difference between wealth and income distributions, leading them to underestimate wealth disparities and to overestimate income disparities. Knowledge of the true distributions, and beliefs about the ideal ones, were found to have some relationships to political ideology for students who described themselves as 'socialists' or 'egalitarians,' but not for students with more mainstream affiliations. Koc students were found to be more egalitarian in their ideal distributions than were Stanford students, who showed weak signs of increasing their tolerance for inequality in the more recent survey. Some possible explanations for students' ignorance of the gap between income and wealth distributions are discussed and evaluated. Evidence suggests that unbiased estimates of economic statistics depend on available data from one's experience, even when reasoning alone could be the basis for a good guess. For various reasons, the wealth/income distribution gap is not easy to see, at least in these two countries. A general awareness of this gap (and of mechanisms that tend to concentrate wealth) might increase popular support for wealth taxes.

Should We Trust in Values? Explaining Public Support for Pro-Environmental Taxes

In this paper we are concerned with what explains public acceptance and support of environmental taxes. We examine findings in environmental psychology emphasizing that people’s (environmental) value-orientation is the dominant driver determining individuals’ support for pro-environmental policy instruments. We introduce a complementary model, mainly drawing upon findings in political science, suggesting that people’s support for policy instruments is dependent on their level of political trust and their trust in other citizens. More specifically, we analyze whether political trust and inter-personal trust affect individuals’ support for an increased carbon dioxide tax in Sweden, while checking their value orientation, self-interest, and various socio-economic values. We make use of survey data obtained from a mail questionnaire sent out to a random sample of 3,000 individuals in 2009. We find that apart from people’s values, beliefs, and norms, both political trust and interpersonal trust have significant effects on people's attitudes toward an increased tax on carbon dioxide.

David Cameron and the Big Society : a new deal for the new citizen

According to the 27th Report of the British Social Attitudes survey published in December 2010, the English public’s attitude to the recipients of welfare benefits, more particularly the unemployed, has hardened. There seems to be much less support for tax and spend policies and for ‘Big Government’ intervention in social matters. Nevertheless, at the same time as the notion that there exists ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving poor’ was reappearing, the same respondents seemed to be fiercely condemning the inequalities that divided their society. An ambiguous attitude that David Cameron’s Conservative Party had to dissect in order to win back the electorate after 18 years out of office. The ‘Big Society´ was the party’s leader’s answer. How far can the Big Society reveal Cameron’s conception of social issues? Can it be used to draw an outline of his perception of what citizenship – here social citizenship – is?

A constructive critique of public health arguments for anti-obesity soda taxes and food taxes

This Article constructively critiques the two arguments that public health advocates have made in support of anti-obesity soda taxes or junk food taxes. Part II discusses and critiques the first argument, an economic externalities argument that government should tax soda or junk food to internalize the disproportionately high health care costs of obesity. Part II also explores alternative economic internalities argument for food or soda taxes, with a focus on incomplete information, bounded rationality, and bounded willpower. Part III discusses and critiques the second argument made by public health advocates, that government should adopt anti-obesity measures to improve population-wide health. This Part considers the appropriate scope of public health law interventions with respect to behavioral risk factors (for example, diet), comments on empirical evidence offered by public health advocates to support proposed soda taxes, and cautions public health advocates to consider possible unintended consequences of anti-obesity proposals.Obesity policy debates present a conflict of fundamental values, such as health, fairness, efficiency, and autonomy. Part IV attempts to reconcile these values and responds to the “personal responsibility” objection to soda taxes and food taxes. Part V considers various factors that would affect behavioral responses to proposed soda taxes and food taxes and addresses concerns that such taxes would be regressive and thus unfair to low-income consumers. This Part also explores the tax design implications of the literature on tax salience and on asymmetric paternalism and libertarian paternalism. Part VI suggests the way forward for public health advocates, including a proposal to enact a tax on nutritionally poor foods and drinks, paired with a salient benefit. In addition, this Part recommends enactment of a federal system of food classification, based on nutrient profiling methods, along with a federal system of front-of-package nutritional labeling.

The political economy of corporate tax harmonization — Why do European politicians (dis)like minimum tax rates?

Setting minimum tax rates is a well discussed way of mitigating pressure from tax competition. This paper investigates which motives shape the support for a minimum corporate tax among politicians. We make use of a unique data base: a survey among members of the European parliament. Our results confirm that the politicians' ideology as well as individual characteristics such as educational background exert a major influence. Moreover, several predictions regarding national interests are derived from various standard tax competition models. These hypotheses are partly supported by the data; in particular, different national preferences towards social equality shape the support. A comparison with survey results from the German Bundestag reveals that German politicians on the national level do not show different attitudes towards tax rate harmonization.

The Big and the Small of Tax Support for R&D in Canada

The Big and the Small of Tax Support for R&D in Canada

A Study on Relation between Type of Child Tax Support System and Women's Economic Activity & Raise of Birth Rate

A Study on Relation between Type of Child Tax Support System and Women's Economic Activity & Raise of Birth Rate

The Non-Sense Tax: A Reply to New Corporate Income Tax Advocacy

This essay challenges recent attempts by influential scholars to rationalize the existence of the corporate income tax. The corporate income tax has long been considered unjustifiable on traditional tax policy grounds. The new justifications recognize that, yet argue that the tax is still desirable because it promotes other goals, such as improvement of corporate governance and restraint of undesirable corporate management power accumulation. The essay demonstrates that the existence and magnitude of these alleged benefits of the corporate income tax are doubtful. Yet, the essay argues, even if taken as correct, the recent rationalization of the corporate income tax cannot support its retention since it misses certain crucial steps in the analysis. First, it does not compare the effects of the corporate income tax with its alternatives. This essay demonstrates that once such comparison takes place, the corporate income tax proves to be less desirable than its alternative on the very grounds promoted by its proponents. Secondly, the support of the corporate income tax completely ignores the social costs of the tax. This essay argues that once taken into account, such costs may overwhelm the alleged benefits, if any. Finally, the essay claims that the recent support of the corporate income tax is based on a strong, yet unproven, popular intuition that the tax is fair. The essay goes on to explain the uncertainty that governs the economic analysis of the burden of the tax, which results in confusion and the inability to assess the fairness of the tax as a whole. This understanding should pull the carpet from underneath the very basis of the arguments in support of the corporate income tax. The essay concludes by asserting that the tax not only should, but also could, be repealed consistent with accepted tax policy principles.

State Level Hot Topic Issues Facing Community Colleges: From the Perspective of the State Directors

The survey on hot topics was added in 2007 to the annual survey of state directors of community colleges conducted by the University of Alabama Education Policy Center. The survey data provided an opportunity for examining the personal attitudes toward the hot topics and the associations between these attitudes and state contexts. This study finds five clear interpretable factors of personal attitudes, and it provides support for the sound psychometric properties of the survey questionnaire. As a group, state directors had an optimistic view toward the increased attention to student success, the development of new data systems to track student success, and the enrollment capacity of community colleges. On the other hand, state directors were less optimistic toward state funding policies and the growth of four-year degree programs at community colleges. They recognized that funding for facilities was a priority, and federal support was needed. The findings indicate that the availability of local tax support influenced state directors’ attitude toward state funding policies. Implications for practitioners and researchers are discussed.

The Big and the Small of Tax Support for R&D in Canada

The Big and the Small of Tax Support for R&D in Canada

Fat Taxes in the EU Between Fiscal Austerity and the Fight Against Obesity

To discourage unhealthy eating and limit the population's intake of fatty foods, thereby alleviating the current obesity “epidemic”, an increasing number of countries across the industrialised world are considering levying taxes on unhealthy food. A “fat tax” may be defined as a tax or surcharge placed upon fattening foods, beverages or individuals with the aim to decrease consumption of foods that are linked to obesity. This is not an entirely new idea – some theorists, starting with Arthur Pigou, a 20th century English economist, have long presented the arguments for imposing special taxes on goods and services whose prices do not reflect the true social cost of their consumption. Examples of Pigouvian taxes are duties on cigarettes, alcohol, gambling and environmental emissions. Support for another such tax, a fat tax, is now spreading across the European Union. On 1 October 2011, Denmark introduced a tax on foods by targeting those products that are high in saturated fat. The Danish Act (hereinafter, Act) confirms the trend in various EU Member States to tax certain foods or consider taxing them in the future.

Rewarding Innovation: Improving Federal Tax Support for Business R&D in Canada

Business innovation is viewed by many as a solution to Canada’s ailing productivity performance. One of the more troubling aspects of Canada’s innovation track record is that businesses spend relatively little on research and development (R&D) despite having access to some of the world’s most generous R&D tax incentives. Canada’s low levels of business R&D have called into question the effectiveness of Canada’s generous R&D tax incentives, particularly the flagship federal Scientific Research and Experimental Development (SR&ED) program. A deeper analysis, however, reveals that tax incentives are effective in stimulating more R&D – that is, Canada would have lower levels of business R&D in the absence of these inducements. Instead, the root cause of Canada’s business R&D deficit appears to stem from structural aspects of the economy and, more importantly, a lack of demand-related pressure to pursue innovation.

A choice experiment on fuel taxation and earmarking in Norway

Pigouvian taxes are efficient — but unpopular among voters — and hence often politically infeasible. Earmarking of revenues has been widely reported to increase public support for taxes, but earmarking is generally not the most efficient use of the revenues. This trade-off between efficiency and political feasibility is the motivation for our primary research objective: to quantify the effect of earmarking on support for fuel tax rises. Our secondary research objective is to investigate why earmarking increases support. Using data from a representative sample of the Norwegian voter population (N = 1147), we estimate models of voter preferences for fuel taxes using logistic regression models. Our results show that, in the absence of earmarking, the majority of voters would like to reduce fuel taxes, but earmarking the revenues for environmental measures has a substantial effect on voter support for fuel tax increases, garnering a majority for increases of up to 15% above present levels. Further analysis indicates that a prime reason why earmarking for environmental measures is popular is that it increases the perceived environmental effectiveness of the tax, and hence its legitimacy as an environmental rather than a fiscal policy instrument.

A Model of Constitutional Constraints on Benevolent Governments and a Reassessment of the 1970s Property Tax Revolt

States forced by courts to tie assessed values to market values created uncertainty about property tax bills and we show that under rational expectations this uncertainty produces voter support for tax limits on benevolent government. We estimate that moving to market reassessment before the 1970s property tax revolt increased the likelihood of enacting a tax limit by 30 percent. Our theoretical and empirical results demonstrate that voters supporting tax limits on benevolent governments in an effort to reduce tax payment uncertainty is consistent with the evidence and thereby refute the notion that tax limits are inconsistent with benevolent local government.

Public acceptance for environmental taxes: Self-interest, environmental and distributional concerns

While strongly recommended by economists, it has often been politically difficult to impose taxes on externalities. There is a substantial literature on public attitudes towards environmental taxes. There has, however, been few comprehensive attempts to understand attitudes towards environmental taxes. The main research question in this paper is which factors influence support for fuel taxation. We propose a model of attitudes towards fuel taxation, and test this model as well as more specific hypotheses, using data from a representative survey of the adult Norwegian population. Our results suggest that support for fuel taxation is best predicted by beliefs about environmental consequences, followed by beliefs about consequences to others. Beliefs about consequences to self (self-interest) is the factor that explains the least variation in support for fuel taxation. The academically interesting result that support cannot be well explained without capturing a broad range of motivational factors is also highly policy relevant. It implies that there is no magic formula for increasing public support for environmental taxes. There are, however, some issues which can be addressed: trust in how well the government spends the revenue, and the perception that taxation does very little to change behaviour and thus to reduce environmental problems.

How Unwavering is Support for the Local Property Tax?: Voting on School District Budgets in New York, 2003-2010

This article examines voting results for school district budgets in New York from 2003-2010. Despite annual local property tax increases, 91.9% of proposed school district budgets were approved by voters during the period examined. Using data from the New York State Education Department (NYSED) and the American Community Survey (ACS), several socioeconomic variables influencing school district budget voting are examined. The findings indicate that school districts serving larger populations are more likely to vote for local property tax increases. However, these effects are mitigated by the size of minority populations in a district, overall growth in school budgets, and increased voter turnout. In light of these findings, recommendations are made to assist school boards and administrators in planning school finance policy. It is argued that school districts should adopt participatory budget tools and enhance community-based decision-making in order to promote sustainable educational resources.

Year 2 of the “Great Recession”: Surviving the Present by Building the Future

ABSTRACT During Fiscal Year 2008–2009 the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) surveyed its 123 members on the impact of the worldwide contraction and reported the results (see http://www.arl.org/sparc/meetings/ala09/index.shtml). The findings indicate the emergence of drastic steps needed to “right size” budgets that were reduced to meet institutional loss of income from a variety of sources, particularly tax support and endowment earnings. The impact of the 1st year of the downturn was taken primarily from operations and staff with large efforts to protect acquisitions. Every indicator pointed to this trend not being sustainable for the next fiscal period. A 2nd survey, conducted in the fall of 2009, indicated that the crisis has grown worse for Fiscal Year 2009–2010. It is anticipated that the steep decline in institutional revenues will continue throughout the year with repeated reductions and cyclical need to constrain expenditures. The necessary budget cutbacks are having an impact on all segments of ARL member library budgets—operations, staff, and acquisitions. It is clear that the elements of recovery being seen worldwide will have no positive impact for higher education in North America for the current fiscal year and likely beyond. Primary income sources have not recovered—state tax revenues are down, endowment expenditures are being eliminated in hopes of growing capital, and tuition is increases are being restrained. The depth of the recession has accelerated a process in the research library community that has been underway for some years. This process is aimed at fundamentally reshaping the mission of the research library to meet transformational changes eventuating from the higher education and scholarly communication environments.

Research, Innovation and Technological Performance in Germany (Report 2010)

On behalf of the Federal Government of Germany, the Commission of Experts for Research and Innovation presents its third report. The format of the report has been revised this year. Part A of the EFI report 2010 discusses current developments and future challenges. Part B of the report then addresses five core topics. The indicators for the status of research and innovation in Part C are presented in a new format, which we hope will be more readily accessible for decision-makers in particular. The financial and economic crisis is not yet over, but there are signs of moderate growth potential for 2010. The German innovation system has done fairly well in the crisis. In addition, appropriate importance has been attached to research, innovation and education in the plans of the new Federal Government. As welcome as these declarations of intent are, it is important to follow these up by adopting specific measures in various key areas. In this third report, the following five topics are addressed in detail. First, the Expert Commission analyses the overall structure of the German innovation system and in particular the role of non-university research (Section B 1). It then presents an interim assessment of the Bologna Process, which is currently the subject of lively public debate (Section B 2). Twenty years after German reunification, research and innovation policies in eastern Germany are reviewed (Section B 3). The Expert Commission also considers Germany’s technological performance in the field of electromobility (Section B 4), and comments on the efforts of the European Commission to introduce a European Union patent and a unified patent court system (Section B 5). Highest priorities for the Federal Government should be the introduction of R&D tax support, improvements to the conditions for Business Angels and venture capital, and the systematic improvement of Germany’s education and research systems. Broad tax advantages for companies and individual tax-payers are no substitute for these urgently needed measures. Instruments which have been shown to have failed, such as the research premium, should be abandoned. Germany continues to do well in terms of creativity, inventiveness and openness to innovations. Despite financial constraints it is important to target investments in order to maintain and expand these strengths.

The unequal lag in Latin American schooling since 1900: follow the money

AbstractFocusing on education–income anomalies, in which a richer country delivers less education than a poorer country, seems a promising way to harvest a part of the rich history that does not lend itself to econometrics. To test the chain of alleged causation from unequal power and wealth to poor schooling, one must follow the public money, or lack of it, in as many contexts as the data will allow. Public funding for mass schooling is the hitherto untested middle link in the chain. The key to Latin America’s poor schooling was the failure to supply tax money, not gender discrimination or any shortfall in market demand for skills. The most glaring anomalies were the Venezuelan and Argentine failures to supply the levels of tax support for mass schooling that their high income could have afforded.