IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/oxford/v39y2023i3p406-437..html
   My bibliography  Save this article

How much tax do the rich really pay? Evidence from the UK

Author

Listed:
  • Arun Advani
  • Helen Hughson
  • Andy Summers

Abstract

Using anonymized administrative data on the population of UK taxpayers, we show that—in line with high-profile anecdotes about the tax affairs of the rich—effective average tax rates (EATRs) decline at the top of the distribution of income and capital gains. We also document substantial variation in EATRs within remuneration level: a quarter of those in the top 1 per cent pay headline rates, while another quarter pay at least 9pp less than the headline rate. Most of this effect is driven by the composition of remuneration, with investment income having lower tax rates and capital gains having lower rates still. If all individuals with income above £100,000 paid the headline rates, this would raise tax revenue on income and gains by £23 billion on a static basis, an increase of 27 per cent in the tax paid by this group.

Suggested Citation

  • Arun Advani & Helen Hughson & Andy Summers, 2023. "How much tax do the rich really pay? Evidence from the UK," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 39(3), pages 406-437.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:oxford:v:39:y:2023:i:3:p:406-437.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/oxrep/grad032
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

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

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Advani, Arun, 2021. "The taxation of capital gains: principles, practice, and directions for reform," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 589, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
    2. Arun Advani, 2021. "Policy Forum: The Taxation of Capital Gains—Principles, Practice, and Directions for Reform," Canadian Tax Journal, Canadian Tax Foundation, vol. 69(4), pages 1231-1250.
    3. Advani, Arun, 2021. "Missing Incomes in the UK : Evidence and Policy Implications," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 1364, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    4. Adam, Stuart & Phillips, David & Roantree, Barra, 2019. "35 years of reforms: A panel analysis of the incidence of, and employee and employer responses to, social security contributions in the UK," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 171(C), pages 29-50.
    5. Katarzyna Anna Bilicka, 2019. "Comparing UK Tax Returns of Foreign Multinationals to Matched Domestic Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(8), pages 2921-2953, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Roberto Iacono & Bard Smedsvik, 2023. "Behavioral responses to wealth taxation: evidence from a Norwegian reform," World Inequality Lab Working Papers halshs-04423923, HAL.

    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. Kim, Jinyoung & Kim, Seonghoon & Koh, Kanghyock, 2022. "Labor market institutions and the incidence of payroll taxation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 209(C).
    2. Matthias Collischon & Kamila Cygan-Rehm & Regina T. Riphahn, 2021. "Employment effects of payroll tax subsidies," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 57(3), pages 1201-1219, October.
    3. Nadia Accoto & Stefano Federico & Giacomo Oddo, 2023. "Trade in services related to intangibles and the profit shifting hypothesis," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 1414, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    4. Yewei Wu & Bofu Zhang, 2023. "Inquiry Letters and Tax Aggressiveness," China & World Economy, Institute of World Economics and Politics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, vol. 31(4), pages 37-65, July.
    5. Garcia-Bernardo, Javier & Janský, Petr, 2024. "Profit shifting of multinational corporations worldwide," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 177(C).
    6. Stuart Adam & Barra Roantree & David Phillips, 2017. "The Incidence of Social Security Contributions in the United Kingdom: Evidence from Discontinuities at Contribution Ceilings," De Economist, Springer, vol. 165(2), pages 181-203, June.
    7. Chen, Xuyang & Hindriks, Jean, 2023. "Multinational Taxation under Pressure: The Role of Tax Deductibility," LIDAM Discussion Papers CORE 2023013, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    8. Petr Janský, 2023. "Corporate Effective Tax Rates for Research and Policy," Public Finance Review, , vol. 51(2), pages 171-205, March.
    9. Clemens Fuest & Stefan Greil & Felix Hugger & Florian Neumeier, 2022. "Global Profit Shifting of Multinational Companies: Evidence from CbCR Micro Data," CESifo Working Paper Series 9757, CESifo.
    10. Nicole Bosch, 2019. "The Incidence of Pension Contributions," CPB Discussion Paper 388.rdf, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    11. Bakke, Julia Tropina & Hopland, Arnt Ove & Møen, Jarle, 2019. "Profit shifting and the effect of stricter transfer pricing regulation on tax revenue," Discussion Papers 2019/11, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Business and Management Science.
    12. Roland Beck & Antonio Coppola & Angus Lewis & Matteo Maggiori & Martin Schmitz & Jesse Schreger, 2024. "The geography of capital allocation in the euro area," IFC Bulletins chapters, in: Bank for International Settlements (ed.), External statistics in a fragmented and uncertain world, volume 62, Bank for International Settlements.
    13. Johannesen, Niels, 2022. "The global minimum tax," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 212(C).
    14. Sebastián Bustos & Dina Pomeranz & Juan Carlos Suárez Serrato & José Vila-Belda & Gabriel Zucman, 2022. "The Race Between Tax Enforcement and Tax Planning: Evidence From a Natural Experiment in Chile," NBER Working Papers 30114, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Katarzyna Bilicka & Evgeniya Dubinina & Petr Janský, 2022. "Fiscal consequences of corporate tax avoidance," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2022-97, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    16. Al-Karablieh, Yazan & Koumanakos, Evangelos & Stantcheva, Stefanie, 2021. "Clearing the bar: Improving tax compliance for small firms through target setting," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
    17. Chen, Xuyang, 2024. "The Global Minimum Tax, Investment Incentives and Asymmetric Tax Competition," MPRA Paper 121893, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Stuart Adam & James Browne & David Phillips & Barra Roantree, 2021. "Frictions and taxpayer responses: evidence from bunching at personal tax thresholds," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 28(3), pages 612-653, June.
    19. Katarzyna A. Bilicka & Michael P. Devereux & İrem Güçeri, 2024. "Tax Policy, Investment and Profit Shifting," NBER Working Papers 33132, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Olbert, Marcel & Spengel, Christoph & Weck, Stefan, 2023. "Multinational firms in tax havens: Corporate motives, regulatory countermeasures, and recent statistics," ZEW Discussion Papers 23-036, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    inequality; horizontal equity; effective tax rates; capital gains tax;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • H23 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Externalities; Redistributive Effects; Environmental Taxes and Subsidies
    • H24 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Personal Income and Other Nonbusiness Taxes and Subsidies

    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:oup:oxford:v:39:y:2023:i:3:p:406-437.. 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: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://academic.oup.com/oxrep .

    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.