A Quantitative Assessment of the Net Wealth Tax: The Spanish Experience

There is growing debate, both social and academic, about the possibility of levying an annual net wealth tax. Until a few years ago, such a proposal appeared difficult to both implement and control, but recent technological innovations, which could greatly facilitate the periodic valuation of wealth...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Durán Cabré, José María, Esteller Moré, Alejandro
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión aceptada para publicación
Fecha de publicación:2021
País:España
Institución:Universidad de Barcelona
Repositorio:Dipòsit Digital de la UB
OAI Identifier:oai:diposit.ub.edu:2445/181510
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/2445/181510
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Impostos sobre el patrimoni
Distribució de la renda
Property tax
Income distribution
Descripción
Sumario:There is growing debate, both social and academic, about the possibility of levying an annual net wealth tax. Until a few years ago, such a proposal appeared difficult to both implement and control, but recent technological innovations, which could greatly facilitate the periodic valuation of wealth, combined with improvements in international tax information sharing could make a "modern wealth tax" possible. Nonetheless, a number of challenges regarding its design still need to be addressed. Taking advantage of the Spanish experience the only EU country to levy a wealth tax we undertake a quantitative analysis of various key legal elements of the current tax (exemptions and the common income and wealth tax ceiling) by means of a tax simulator we have developed; we also analyze its redistributive power. Our results show that the family business exemption and the common ceilings are highly regressive. We also assess the effectiveness of alternative reforms with more comprehensive tax bases.