Sufficient Statistics for Nonlinear Tax Systems with General Across-Income Heterogeneity
推导了在偏好、遗产、收入转移能力等跨收入异质性下，最优非线性税收系统的可实证充分统计量公式，并应用于美国发现最优储蓄税多为正且累进。
This paper provides empirically implementable sufficient statistics formulas for optimal nonlinear tax systems in the presence of across-income heterogeneity in preferences, inheritances, income-shifting capabilities, and other sources. We characterize optimal smooth tax systems on income and savings (or other commodities), as well as simpler tax systems. We use familiar elasticity concepts and a novel sufficient statistic for heterogeneity correlated with earnings ability: the difference between across-income variation in savings and the causal effect of income on savings. We apply these formulas to the United States and find that the optimal savings tax is mostly positive and progressive.