IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/pubfin/v41y2013i4p391-420.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Decentralization and Tax Competition between Asymmetrical Local Governments

Author

Listed:
  • Clément Carbonnier

Abstract

This article presents a model of tax competition between an arbitrarily large number of asymmetrical jurisdictions. Tax competition induces lower corporate taxes and lower public input provision than does tax coordination. This bias decreases with respect to the size and number of jurisdictions. Tax competition constitutes a cost of decentralization that may balance the gains presented by the decentralization theorem. A French panel of municipalities and intermunicipal jurisdictions is used to test these results, which are confirmed. Furthermore, the corporate tax increase due to cooperation leads to an increase in the corporate tax base: the fully decentralized situation is suboptimal.

Suggested Citation

  • Clément Carbonnier, 2013. "Decentralization and Tax Competition between Asymmetrical Local Governments," Public Finance Review, , vol. 41(4), pages 391-420, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:pubfin:v:41:y:2013:i:4:p:391-420
    DOI: 10.1177/1091142113482352
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1091142113482352
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/1091142113482352?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Masayoshi Hayashi & Robin Boadway, 2001. "An empirical analysis of intergovernmental tax interaction: the case of business income taxes in Canada," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 34(2), pages 481-503, May.
    2. Wilson, John Douglas, 1991. "Tax competition with interregional differences in factor endowments," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 423-451, November.
    3. Alberto Alesina & Enrico Spolaore, 1997. "On the Number and Size of Nations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(4), pages 1027-1056.
    4. Barankay, Iwan & Lockwood, Ben, 2007. "Decentralization and the productive efficiency of government: Evidence from Swiss cantons," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(5-6), pages 1197-1218, June.
    5. Matthieu Leprince & Thierry Madiès & Sonia Paty, 2007. "Business Tax Interactions Among Local Governments: An Empirical Analysis Of The French Case," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(3), pages 603-621, August.
    6. Robert M. Schwab & Wallace E. Oates & Robert M. Schwab & Wallace E. Oates, 2004. "Community Composition and the Provision of Local Public Goods: A Normative Analysis," Chapters, in: Environmental Policy and Fiscal Federalism, chapter 12, pages 211-231, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    7. Peralta, Susana & van Ypersele, Tanguy, 2006. "Coordination of capital taxation among asymmetric countries," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(6), pages 708-726, November.
    8. Edward L. Glaeser & Joshua D. Gottlieb, 2009. "The Wealth of Cities: Agglomeration Economies and Spatial Equilibrium in the United States," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(4), pages 983-1028, December.
    9. Arzaghi, Mohammad & Henderson, J. Vernon, 2005. "Why countries are fiscally decentralizing," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(7), pages 1157-1189, July.
    10. Hoyt, William H., 1991. "Property taxation, Nash equilibrium, and market power," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 123-131, July.
    11. George R. Zodrow & Peter Mieszkowski, 2019. "Pigou, Tiebout, Property Taxation, and the Underprovision of Local Public Goods," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: George R Zodrow (ed.), TAXATION IN THEORY AND PRACTICE Selected Essays of George R. Zodrow, chapter 17, pages 525-542, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    12. Michael Smart, 1998. "Taxation and Deadweight Loss in a System of Intergovernmental Transfers," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 31(1), pages 189-206, February.
    13. Todd M. Gabe & Kathleen P. Bell, 2004. "Tradeoffs between Local Taxes and Government Spending as Determinants of Business Location," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(1), pages 21-41, February.
    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. Quentin Frère & Lionel Védrine, 2024. "Does decentralisation theorem shape intermunicipal cooperation?," Post-Print hal-04739942, HAL.
    2. Elisabeth Gugl & George R. Zodrow, 2014. "The Efficiency of “Benefit-Related” Business Taxes," Working Papers 1406, Oxford University Centre for Business Taxation.
    3. Ryota Nakatani, 2024. "Revenue Decentralization and the Probability of a Fiscal Crisis: Is There a Tipping Point for Adverse Effects?," Public Finance Review, , vol. 52(3), pages 376-396, May.
    4. Ida, Tomoya & Wilhelmsson, Mats, 2014. "An Empirical Test Of The Dominant Tax Externality In Sweden," Working Paper Series 14/5, Royal Institute of Technology, Department of Real Estate and Construction Management & Banking and Finance.
    5. Clémence Tricaud, 2019. "Better alone? Evidence on the costs of intermunicipal cooperation," Economics Working Paper from Condorcet Center for political Economy at CREM-CNRS 2019-12-ccr, Condorcet Center for political Economy.
    6. repec:hal:journl:hal-03380333 is not listed 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. Clément Carbonnier, 2008. "Fiscal competition between decentralized jurisdictions, theoretical and empirical evidence," THEMA Working Papers 2008-17, THEMA (THéorie Economique, Modélisation et Applications), Université de Cergy-Pontoise.
    2. Thierry Madiès & Sonia Paty & Yvon Rocaboy, 2005. "Externalités fiscales horizontales et verticales. Où en est la théorie du fédéralisme financier ?," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 115(1), pages 17-63.
    3. Brülhart, Marius & Bucovetsky, Sam & Schmidheiny, Kurt, 2015. "Taxes in Cities," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 1123-1196, Elsevier.
    4. Baskaran, Thushyanthan & Lopes da Fonseca, Mariana, 2013. "The economics and empirics of tax competition: A survey," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 163, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    5. Thierry Madiès & Sonia Paty & Yvon Rocaboy, 2005. "Les stratégies fiscales des collectivités locales. De la théorie à la réalité," Revue de l'OFCE, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 94(3), pages 283-315.
    6. Sam Bucovetsky & Michael Smart, 2006. "The Efficiency Consequences of Local Revenue Equalization: Tax Competition and Tax Distortions," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 8(1), pages 119-144, January.
    7. Brulhart, Marius & Jametti, Mario, 2006. "Vertical versus horizontal tax externalities: An empirical test," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(10-11), pages 2027-2062, November.
    8. Stephanie Armbruster & Beat Hintermann, 2020. "Decentralization with porous borders: public production in a federation with tax competition and spillovers," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 27(3), pages 606-642, June.
    9. Sotiris Karkalakos & Christos Kotsogiannis, 2007. "A spatial analysis of provincial corporate income tax responses: evidence from Canada," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 40(3), pages 782-811, August.
    10. Leonzio Rizzo, 2006. "Le inefficienze della competizione fiscale: una rassegna dei principali modelli teorici," Economia politica, Società editrice il Mulino, issue 1, pages 89-120.
    11. Michael P. Devereux & Simon Loretz, 2013. "What Do We Know About Corporate Tax Competition?," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 66(3), pages 745-774, September.
    12. Franks, Max & Lessmann, Kai, 2023. "Tax competition with asymmetric endowments in fossil resources," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    13. Siggelkow, Benjamin Florian, 2018. "Tax competition and the implications of national tax policy coordination in the presence of fiscal federalism," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 17-29.
    14. Hannes Winner, 2012. "Fiscal Competition and the Composition of Public Expenditure: An Empirical Study," Contemporary Economics, University of Economics and Human Sciences in Warsaw., vol. 6(3), September.
    15. Zodrow, George R, 2003. "Tax Competition and Tax Coordination in the European Union," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 10(6), pages 651-671, November.
    16. Carl Gaigné & Stéphane Riou, 2007. "Globalization, Asymmetric Tax Competition, and Fiscal Equalization," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 9(5), pages 901-925, October.
    17. Gaigné, Carl & Riou, Stéphane & Thisse, Jacques-François, 2016. "How to make the metropolitan area work? Neither big government, nor laissez-faire," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 100-113.
    18. Sylvie Charlot & Sonia Paty & Virginie Piguet, 2015. "Does Fiscal Cooperation Increase Local Tax Rates in Urban Areas?," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 49(10), pages 1706-1721, October.
    19. Marko Köthenbürger, 2002. "Tax Competition and Fiscal Equalization," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 9(4), pages 391-408, August.
    20. Wilson, John Douglas & Wildasin, David E., 2004. "Capital tax competition: bane or boon," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(6), pages 1065-1091, June.

    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:sae:pubfin:v:41:y:2013:i:4:p:391-420. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    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.