IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/juecon/v138y2023ics0094119023000748.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The geography of mortgage interest deductions

Author

Listed:
  • Blouri, Yashar
  • Büchler, Simon
  • Schöni, Olivier

Abstract

We investigate the heterogeneous impact of the US federal mortgage interest deduction (MID) on households’ location and tenure decisions. We develop a spatial general-equilibrium model featuring non-homothetic preferences in which households can choose whether to claim the MID or a standard tax deduction. Repealing the MID decreases homeownership rates more strongly in central areas because owner-occupiers migrate to the countryside. Welfare increases slightly because positive externalities from less congested housing markets and undistorted tenure decisions outweigh productivity losses in central locations. An increase in standard tax deductions, as implemented in 2018 by the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, leads to a similar welfare increase.

Suggested Citation

  • Blouri, Yashar & Büchler, Simon & Schöni, Olivier, 2023. "The geography of mortgage interest deductions," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 138(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:juecon:v:138:y:2023:i:c:s0094119023000748
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jue.2023.103604
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0094119023000748
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jue.2023.103604?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Simonovska, Ina & Waugh, Michael E., 2014. "The elasticity of trade: Estimates and evidence," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(1), pages 34-50.
    2. Pierre-Philippe Combes & Gilles Duranton & Laurent Gobillon & Sébastien Roux, 2010. "Estimating Agglomeration Economies with History, Geology, and Worker Effects," NBER Chapters, in: Agglomeration Economics, pages 15-66, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Redding, Stephen J., 2016. "Goods trade, factor mobility and welfare," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 148-167.
    4. Ferdinando Monte & Stephen J. Redding & Esteban Rossi-Hansberg, 2018. "Commuting, Migration, and Local Employment Elasticities," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(12), pages 3855-3890, December.
    5. Chang-Tai Hsieh & Enrico Moretti, 2019. "Housing Constraints and Spatial Misallocation," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 11(2), pages 1-39, April.
    6. Kamila Sommer & Paul Sullivan, 2018. "Implications of US Tax Policy for House Prices, Rents, and Homeownership," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(2), pages 241-274, February.
    7. Rappaport, Jordan, 2007. "Moving to nice weather," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 375-398, May.
    8. Cecile Gaubert & Patrick M. Kline & Damián Vergara & Danny Yagan, 2021. "Place-Based Redistribution," NBER Working Papers 28337, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Hilber, Christian A.L. & Robert-Nicoud, Frédéric, 2013. "On the origins of land use regulations: Theory and evidence from US metro areas," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 29-43.
    10. Pablo D Fajgelbaum & Eduardo Morales & Juan Carlos Suárez Serrato & Owen Zidar, 2019. "State Taxes and Spatial Misallocation," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 86(1), pages 333-376.
    11. Joseph G. Altonji & David Card, 1991. "The Effects of Immigration on the Labor Market Outcomes of Less-skilled Natives," NBER Chapters, in: Immigration, Trade, and the Labor Market, pages 201-234, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Pollak, Robert A & Wales, Terrence J, 1969. "Estimation of the Linear Expenditure System," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 37(4), pages 611-628, October.
    13. Christian A. L. Hilber & Tracy M. Turner, 2014. "The Mortgage Interest Deduction and its Impact on Homeownership Decisions," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 96(4), pages 618-637, October.
    14. Saiz, Albert, 2007. "Immigration and housing rents in American cities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(2), pages 345-371, March.
    15. James Poterba & Todd Sinai, 2008. "Tax Expenditures for Owner-Occupied Housing: Deductions for Property Taxes and Mortgage Interest and the Exclusion of Imputed Rental Income," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(2), pages 84-89, May.
    16. Hanson, Andrew, 2012. "Size of home, homeownership, and the mortgage interest deduction," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 195-210.
    17. Edward L. Glaeser & Jesse M. Shapiro, 2003. "The Benefits of the Home Mortgage Interest Deduction," NBER Chapters, in: Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 17, pages 37-82, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Melo, Patricia C. & Graham, Daniel J. & Noland, Robert B., 2009. "A meta-analysis of estimates of urban agglomeration economies," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 332-342, May.
    19. David E. Rappoport, 2016. "Do Mortgage Subsidies Help or Hurt Borrowers?," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2016-081, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    20. Pablo D Fajgelbaum & Cecile Gaubert, 2020. "Optimal Spatial Policies, Geography, and Sorting [“Theories of Systems of Cities,”]," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 135(2), pages 959-1036.
    21. Albert Saiz, 2010. "The Geographic Determinants of Housing Supply," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 125(3), pages 1253-1296.
    22. Treb Allen & Costas Arkolakis, 2014. "Trade and the Topography of the Spatial Economy," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 129(3), pages 1085-1140.
    23. David Albouy, 2009. "The Unequal Geographic Burden of Federal Taxation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 117(4), pages 635-667, August.
    24. Kenneth W. Clements & Marc Jim M. Mariano & George Verikios, 2020. "Estimating The Linear Expenditure System With Cross-Sectional Data," Economics Discussion / Working Papers 20-18, The University of Western Australia, Department of Economics.
    25. Binner, Amy & Day, Brett, 2015. "Exploring mortgage interest deduction reforms: An equilibrium sorting model with endogenous tenure choice," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 40-54.
    26. Joseph Gyourko & Todd Sinai, 2003. "The Spatial Distribution of Housing‐Related Ordinary Income Tax Benefits," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 31(4), pages 527-575, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yashar Blouri, Simon B chler, Olivier Sch ni, 2019. "The Geography of Housing Subsidies," Diskussionsschriften credresearchpaper25, Universitaet Bern, Departement Volkswirtschaft - CRED.
    2. Stephen J. Redding & Esteban Rossi-Hansberg, 2017. "Quantitative Spatial Economics," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 9(1), pages 21-58, September.
    3. Blouri, Yashar & Ehrlich, Maximilian V., 2020. "On the optimal design of place-based policies: A structural evaluation of EU regional transfers," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    4. Albouy, David & Behrens, Kristian & Robert-Nicoud, Frédéric & Seegert, Nathan, 2019. "The optimal distribution of population across cities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 102-113.
    5. Parkhomenko, Andrii, 2023. "Local causes and aggregate implications of land use regulation," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 138(C).
    6. Dawkins, Casey J., 2023. "The geography of US homeownership tax expenditures," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(PA).
    7. Marcel Henkel & Tobias Seidel & Jens Suedekum, 2021. "Fiscal Transfers in the Spatial Economy," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 13(4), pages 433-468, November.
    8. Krebs, Oliver & Pflüger, Michael, 2023. "On the road (again): Commuting and local employment elasticities in Germany," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(C).
    9. Büchler, Simon & Ehrlich, Maximilian v. & Schöni, Olivier, 2021. "The amplifying effect of capitalization rates on housing supply," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    10. Hembre, Erik & Dantas, Raissa, 2022. "Tax incentives and housing decisions: Effects of the Tax Cut and Jobs Act," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(C).
    11. Hal Martin, 2018. "The Impact of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act on Local Home Values," Working Papers (Old Series) 1806, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    12. Colas, Mark & Saulnier, Emmett, 2023. "Vertical migration externalities," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    13. Stephan Heblich & Stephen J Redding & Daniel M Sturm, 2020. "The Making of the Modern Metropolis: Evidence from London," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 135(4), pages 2059-2133.
    14. Christian A. L. Hilber, 2017. "The Economic Implications of House Price Capitalization: A Synthesis," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 45(2), pages 301-339, April.
    15. Duranton, Gilles & Puga, Diego, 2014. "The Growth of Cities," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 5, pages 781-853, Elsevier.
    16. Redding, Stephen, 2020. "Trade and Geography," CEPR Discussion Papers 15268, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    17. Lin Tian & Jonathan Vogel & Gordon Hanson & Ariel Burstein, 2017. "Immigration, Occupations, and Local Labor Markets: Theory and Evidence from the U.S," 2017 Meeting Papers 79, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    18. Albert, Christoph & Monras, Joan, 2017. "Immigrants' Residential Choices and Their Consequences," IZA Discussion Papers 11075, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    19. Pablo D Fajgelbaum & Eduardo Morales & Juan Carlos Suárez Serrato & Owen Zidar, 2019. "State Taxes and Spatial Misallocation," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 86(1), pages 333-376.
    20. Gaubert, Cécile & Faber, Benjamin, 2018. "Tourism and Economic Development: Evidence from Mexico’s Coastline," CEPR Discussion Papers 12644, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Tax deduction; Residential location; Tenure choice; Rental Markets; Housing supply;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • R1 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics
    • R3 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Real Estate Markets, Spatial Production Analysis, and Firm Location
    • H2 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue
    • H3 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:juecon:v:138:y:2023:i:c:s0094119023000748. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622905 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.