The individual income tax structure in the U.S. was dramatically changed during the Reagan years. In particular, marginal taxes for married households were significantly reduced while married female labor force participation rate rose by 13 percentage points. In a recent article published in Review of Economic Dynamics, Remzi Kaygusuz found that more than 20% of this change is accounted for by the changes in taxes. In “Taxation and Household Labor Supply” (forthcoming in The Review of Economic Studies), Remzi and his coauthors (Nezih Guner and Gustavo Ventura) evaluate hypothetical income tax reforms for the U.S. economy. They find that tax reforms are accompanied by large increases in labor supply that differ across demographic groups, with the bulk of the increase coming from married females. Using the framework developed in this paper, the trio produced a new paper “Taxing Women: A Macroeconomic Analysis” (forthcoming in Journal of Monetary Economics) in which they quantify the welfare and aggregate implications of moving from the current U.S. tax system to gender-based taxation. They find that gender-based proportional taxes improve welfare and are preferred by a majority of households. However, they also find that welfare gains are higher when the U.S. tax system is replaced by a proportional, gender-neutral income tax.
