Public Economics Lectures Part 1: Introduction

Excess Burden with Transfer Costs
Let LI = wl be the total (pretax) earned income and TI = wl − e
denote taxable income
Exploit the envelope condition for term in curly brackets:
dW
dt
= −(wl − e) + (wl − e) + dz de
de dt
= t dTI
dt + dz de
de dt
= t dLI
dt − t de
dt + dz de
de dt
+ t
d[wl − e]
dt
First-order condition for individual’s choice of e:
t = dz
de
⇒
dW = t dLI
dt dt
Intuition: MPB of raising e by $1 (saving $t) equals MPC
(1)
Public Economics Lectures () Part 3: Effi ciency 67 / 105