The value of tax progressivity: Evidence from survey experiments

The aim of this paper is to investigate how people value tax progressivity. More precisely, I study the potential trade-off between any improvement in the final income distribution and the progressivity of the tax schedule. To do this, I designed survey experiments in which respondents were asked to rank or to choose between different taxation-redistribution schemes with different treatments varying in terms of information availability: (1) when only information about final incomes is provided; and (2) when information about average tax rates is also available. Using a within-subject design, the instability of rankings between (1) and (2) indicates whether or not respondents value tax progressivity. I find that information about tax rates significantly affects respondents' judgments about tax schemes. They exhibit a strong preference for tax progressivity, i.e., they accept a fall in the quality of the final income distribution in exchange for progressive taxation. The results of an additional treatment suggest that the mere fact of providing new information cannot account for this finding.