This thesis consists of five papers, summarized as follows.  "Disability Insurance, Population Health, and Employment in Sweden" This paper describes the development of population health and disability insurance utilization for older workers in Sweden and analyzes the relation between the two. We also study the effects of changes in eligibility criteria for older workers.  "Does Privatization of Vocational Rehabilitation Improve Labor Market Opportunities? Evidence from a Field Experiment in Sweden" This paper analyzes if privatization of vocational rehabilitation improves labor market opportunities for long-term sick, using a field experiment. We find no differences in employment rates following rehabilitation between individuals who received rehabilitation by private and public providers.  "Screening Stringency in the Disability Insurance Program" This paper proposes a strategy for assessing how the inflow to the disability insurance program has been governed over time. We analyze the ex-ante health of new beneficiaries by using ex-post mortality. We find large variation in the relative health of new beneficiaries compared to non-beneficiaries in Sweden over time.  "The Effect of Age-Targeted Tax Credits on Retirement Behavior" This paper analyzes the effect of two tax credits for workers above age 65 implemented in Sweden in 2007: an earned income tax credit and a payroll tax credit. I find that the age-targeted tax credits increased employment in the year following the 65th birthday, but the increase was not large enough to offset the implied decrease in tax revenues.  "Wage Dynamics and Firm-Level Shocks" This paper proposes a framework for introducing the firm into empirical models of the dynamic income process. The model allows for studying the extent to which firm-level productivity shocks are transmitted to wages. Selection into employment and between jobs is explicitly modeled. We also present a strategy for estimation and identification of the model

The Mirrlees Review recommends that commodity taxation should in general be uniform, but with some goods consumed in conjunction with labour supply (such as child care) left untaxed. This paper examines the validity of this claim in an optimal income tax framework. Contrary to the recommendation of the Review, our theoretical results imply that even if all goods other than the good needed for working are separable from leisure, the optimal tax on these goods should not be uniform. Instead, goods with larger expenditure elasticities should be discouraged relatively more by the tax system. If the government fully subsidises the cost of the good needed for working, then commodity taxation is uniform under the standard separability assumption. Our results imply that the optimal commodity tax system is dependent on the expenditure side of the government. A calibration exercise presented in the paper suggests that these results can be quantitatively important.

<p> My doctoral dissertation is composed of an introductory chapter followed by five independent chapters on household savings and finances.</p> <p> After the introductory chapter, the second chapter investigates the living standards of Canadian retirees and the adequacy of their financial preparations. We explore the responses of Canadian retirees to subjective survey questions administrated in General Social Surveys and in the 1975 Retirement Survey. Our results show that a significant portion of Canadians report enjoying life more after retirement compared to before retirement. Moreover, in 2002, three quarters of retired Canadians indicated being at least as satisfied with their finances as they were in the year prior to retirement. The most significant correlate of financial dissatisfaction that our analysis uncovers is involuntary retirement and, in particular, involuntary retirement associated with poor health.</p> <p> The third chapter revisits a long standing question of whether households with higher lifetime income save a larger fraction of their income. The major difficulty in empirically assessing the relationship between lifetime incomes and saving rates is finding a credible proxy for lifetime income. Taking advantage of the unique characteristics of the Canadian Family Expenditure Survey data, we construct reliable lifetime income proxies. Our empirical analysis suggests that the estimated relationship between saving rates and lifetime incomes is sensitive to the instrument used to proxy lifetime income. Nevertheless, our preferred estimates indicate that, except for the poorest households (who simply do not save), saving rates do not differ substantially across lifetime income groups. </p> <p> The fourth chapter examines the effect of taxation on households' portfolio allocation decisions. The key challenge in empirically assessing this relation is to find a substantial and plausibly exogenous source of variation in marginal tax rates. We use variation in marginal tax rates across households with the same total earnings, which arise in progressive income tax systems with individual taxation. Employing the Canadian Survey of Household Finances, we find statistically significant but economically modest responses to differential taxation.</p> <p> The fifth chapter investigates the problems associated with the estimation of intertemporal allocation parameters via linearized Euler Equations. We solve and simulate life-cycle consumption models in different economic environments and perform Monte Carlo experiments with these simulated data. Our results suggest that problems associated with the estimation of linearized Euler equations are strongly related to the assumed economic environments. In particular, the validity and relevance of conventional instruments used in the estimation depend on the concavity of the underlying policy rules, which in turn follows from features of the economic environment.</p> <p> The final chapter reviews the economic literature on the saving behavior of lower income households. Our discussion focuses on the motives shaping the saving behavior of low-income households. In addition to the standard economic framework used for analysis of this kind, the Life-Cycle/Permanent Income Hypothesis, we also discuss insights from "behavioral" economics. We review the international evidence on a variety of policies designed to stimulate savings among low income households.</p> / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

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No / This paper investigates the equilibrium relationship between taxation, portfolio choice (risk-taking) and capital accumulation. Specifically, it examines how taxes affect risk-taking and capital accumulation. We extend the existing literature by relaxing two crucial assumptions in modelling risk-taking behavior: (i) that the investment opportunity set is fixed and (ii) that there is no distinction between attitudes towards risk and behavior towards intertemporal substitution. We extend the investment opportunity set of individuals through optimally determined human capital; and distinguish intertemporal substitution from attitudes towards risk via a recursive utility function. In the presence of these extensions, the paper successfully derives a closed-form solution to the stochastic growth model with stochastic wage income.

Thesis (LL.M. (Import and Export Law))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2008.

Thesis (LL.M. (Import and Export Law))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2008.

Thesis (LL.M. (Import and Export Law))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2008.

In my dissertation I examine the taxation of income of companies and their partners. In using the method of comparison, I evaluate the crucial aspects of tax and business law of the Czech Republic and the Kingdom of Belgium (hereinafter referred to as Belgium). My goal is to compare the mutual complexity and comprehensibility of these legal regulations, which could influence the decisions of potential investors, mainly using the method of description and analysis. In my work I find out the degree of competitiveness and the attractiveness of individual forms of business affected by the legal requirements for these companies. In the first part, I analyze the tax system of the Czech Republic. In this chapter, I outline the reasons for the declining trend in the share of direct taxes in the tax mixes of developed countries, and also views on the real effect of tax competition. I consider the resolution of the residency conflict and the issue of double taxation treaties to be a key issue, the clarification of which is important for the correct use of the methods of double taxation measures, when assessing their advantages and disadvantages that I see in the methods used. The next chapter is devoted to the analysis of companies established under Czech law. I compare these companies using their main...

My dissertation consists of three essays focused on identifying the strategic responses of governments and individuals following changes in the tax and transfer system. Two essays contribute to the literature on fiscal competition, focusing on state level polices aimed at redistributing income. A third essay contributes to the literature estimating the responsiveness of individual’s incomes to changing marginal tax rates. A better understanding of these responses contributes to our ability to design an optimal tax and transfer system in a federalist nation. In essay 1 I employ a spatial dynamic approach to investigate interstate welfare competition across multiple policy instruments and across three distinct welfare periods - the AFDC regime, the experimental waiver period leading up to the reform, and the TANF era. Results suggest the strategic setting of welfare policy occurs over multiple dimensions of welfare including the effective benefit level and the effective tax rate applied to recipient's earned income. Furthermore, strategic behavior appears to have increased over time, a finding consistent with a race to the bottom after welfare reform. Another form of interstate competition examined in Essay 3 is the spatial patterns in state level estate tax policy. My examination follows a major reform which greatly altered both the state and federal estate tax landscape. This study develops a model in which a state’s tax base and rate are simultaneously determined. Results indicate a state’s estate tax base is negatively influenced by its own tax rate and positively influenced by the tax rate set in neighboring jurisdictions. A state’s own tax rate is also found to be positively influenced by the tax rates set in neighboring jurisdictions. Last, Essay 2 uses matched panels from the Current Population Survey for survey years 1980-2009 to estimate the elasticity of taxable income (ETI) and how it varies in response to measurement of the tax rate, heterogeneity across education attainment, selection on observables and unobservable, and identification. Substantial variation in the ETI across all key economic and statistical decisions is found.