Housing Market Responses to Transaction Taxes: Evidence From Notches and Stimulus in the U.K.
利用英国2004-2012年所有房产交易的行政数据，结合税收级次和刺激政策的准实验变化，发现交易税严重扭曲价格、数量和时机，而临时减税是有效的财政刺激，短期增加20%的市场活动，且效果逆转不足一半。
We investigate housing market responses to transaction taxes using administrative data on all property transactions in the U.K. from 2004 to 2012 combined with quasi-experimental variation from tax notches and tax stimulus. We present two main findings. First, transaction taxes are highly distortionary across a range of margins, causing large distortions to the price, volume, and timing of property transactions. Secondly, temporary transaction tax cuts are an enormously effective form of fiscal stimulus. A temporary elimination of a 1% transaction tax increased housing market activity by 20% in the short run (due to both timing and extensive responses) and less than half of the stimulus effect was reversed after the tax was reintroduced (due to re-timing). Because of the complementarities between moving house and consumer spending, these stimulus effects translate into extra spending per dollar of tax cut equal to about 1. We interpret our empirical findings in the context of a housing model with downpayment constraints in which leverage amplifies the effects of transaction taxes.