Optimal Mirrleesean Taxation in a Ben-Porath Economy
研究了在能力和人力资本不可观测的生命周期经济中，最优税收如何随年龄变化，发现最优边际所得税率随年龄递减，与美国的税收制度和人力资本可观测模型形成对比。
I characterize optimal taxes in a life-cycle economy where ability and human capital are unobservable. I show that unobservable human capital effectively makes preferences over labor nonseparable across age. I generalize the static optimal tax formulas to account for such nonseparabilities and show how they depend both on own-Frisch labor elasticities and cross-Frisch labor elasticities. I calibrate the economy to US data. I find that the optimal marginal income taxes decrease with age, in contrast to both the US tax code and to a model with observable human capital. I demonstrate that the behavior of cross-Frisch elasticities is essential in explaining the decline.