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Yardstick competition and partial coordination: Exploring the empirical distribution of local business tax rates

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  • Buettner, Thiess
  • von Schwerin, Axel

Abstract

This paper explores a striking form of tax policy interdependence that can be observed in the German federation. Though municipalities enjoy discretion in setting the local business tax rate, large fractions of municipalities – in some states even the majority – set identical tax rates. Our analysis shows that this tax-rate “bunching” is not the result of federal or state-level institutions. Possible explanations rest on partial coordination and yardstick competition. The role of the former is exemplified by the finding that small jurisdictions and jurisdictions sharing the same county are more likely to engage in “bunching”. Yardstick competition seems also relevant since jurisdictions for which strategic tax-setting should be associated with larger gains and lower cost are in fact more likely to set identical tax rates.

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  • Buettner, Thiess & von Schwerin, Axel, 2016. "Yardstick competition and partial coordination: Exploring the empirical distribution of local business tax rates," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 178-201.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:124:y:2016:i:c:p:178-201
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2015.10.013
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    Cited by:

    1. Albert Argilaga & Jijian Fan, 2022. "Optimal Policymaking under Yardstick Vote: An Experimental Study," Games, MDPI, vol. 13(3), pages 1-24, May.
    2. Blesse, Sebastian & Lergetporer, Philipp & Nover, Justus & Werner, Katharina, 2023. "Transparency and policy competition: Experimental evidence from German citizens and politicians," ZEW Discussion Papers 23-007, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    3. Giuseppe Di Liddo & Annalisa Vinella, 2022. "Asymmetric yardstick competition: traditional procurement versus public-private partnerships," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 8(3), pages 669-695, November.
    4. Florence Lachet-Touya, 2016. "EU tax competition and tax avoidance: A multiprincipal perspective," Working papers of CATT hal-02939340, HAL.
    5. Di Liddo, Giuseppe & Morone, Andrea, 2017. "Yardstick competition and fiscal disparities: An experimental study," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 134-137.
    6. Bonev, Petyo & Glachant, Matthieu & Söderberg, Magnus, 2022. "Implicit yardstick competition between heating monopolies in urban areas: Theory and evidence from Sweden," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    7. Trojanek, Maria & Kisiala, Wojciech & Trojanek, Radoslaw, 2021. "Do local governments follow their neighbours’ tax strategies? Tax mimicking amongst Polish municipalities," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    8. Besart Avdiu, 2019. "Information Frictions and Tax Inertia," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 39(3), pages 2210-2220.
    9. Geschwind, Stephan & Roesel, Felix, 2022. "Taxation under direct democracy," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 200(C), pages 536-554.
    10. Florence Lachet-Touya, 2016. "EU tax competition and tax avoidance: A multiprincipal perspective," Working Papers hal-02939340, HAL.
    11. Tao, Peng & Gong, Feng & Zhu, Kaiyue, 2023. "Tax competition among local governments: Evidence from the spillovers of location-based tax incentives in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    12. Florence Lachet-Touya, 2016. "Horizontal and Vertical Tax Interactions in a Common Agency Game," Working papers of CATT hal-02939399, HAL.
    13. Buettner, Thiess & Poehnlein, Maximilian, 2024. "Tax competition effects of a minimum tax rate: Empirical evidence from German municipalities," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 236(C).
    14. Florence TOUYA, 2016. "Horizontal and Vertical Tax Interactions in a Common Agency Game," Working Papers 2015-2016_12, CATT - UPPA - Université de Pau et des Pays de l'Adour, revised Aug 2016.
    15. Bin Wu & Xuefei Xu & Zhenzhong Feng, 2018. "Investment Promotion, Fiscal Competition and Economic Growth Sustainability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(1), pages 1-12, January.
    16. Zdražil Pavel & Pernica Bohuslav, 2021. "Stimuli contributing to local property taxation – with the focus on spatial effects of industry and functional urban areas," Central European Journal of Public Policy, Sciendo, vol. 15(1), pages 55-66, June.
    17. Alexander Klein & Guy Tchuente, 2020. "Spatial Differencing for Sample Selection Models with Unobserved Heterogeneity," Papers 2009.06570, arXiv.org.
    18. Florence TOUYA, 2016. "EU tax competition and tax avoidance: A multiprincipal perspective," Working Papers 2015-2016_11, CATT - UPPA - Université de Pau et des Pays de l'Adour, revised Aug 2016.
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Local business tax; Tax competition; Yardstick competition; Partial tax coordination; Location; Asymmetric information;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H71 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue
    • H77 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - Intergovernmental Relations; Federalism

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