tax burdens

[Brad De Long]

>>On the incidence of corporate taxes - I suspect capital wouldn't spend so
>much money on think tanks, lobbyists, and PR if they didn't bear at least
>some of the cost.>
>
>Me too.  The same would follow to some
>degree for the incidence of sales taxes.
>There is usually strong business opposition
>to increases in these.
>
>There is some evidence that the only way
>capital pays any tax is thru the corporate
>tax.  Opportunities for legal tax avoidance
>under the personal income tax motivate some
>analysts to believe that the average rate of
>tax on capital in the personal income tax is
>zero.
>
>MBS

Would be zero if they followed the advice of their tax lawyers. But lots of
people don't optimally postpone capital gains liability. And for some
peculiar reason corporations do continue to pay dividends rather than buy
back their shares...

Brad DeLong