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Working Paper
Evaluating state tax revenue variability: a portfolio approach
State revenue variability is evaluated using a volatility model rooted in portfolio theory. The model evaluates how closely a state's revenue portfolio is constructed to minimize variability in total state tax revenue. The model complements parametric methods of revenue variability.
Journal Article
Tax rates and revenue since the 1970s
Before 2000, the tax burden shifted from the lowest 80% of earners to the highest 20%; since 2000, the burden has shrunk for all groups, but more so for the highest earners.
Working Paper
Predicting College Closures and Financial Distress
In this paper, we assemble the most comprehensive dataset to date on the characteristics of colleges and universities, including dates of operation, institutional setting, student body, staff, and finance data from 2002 to 2023. We provide an extensive description of what is known and unknown about closed colleges compared with institutions that did not close. Using this data, we first develop a series of predictive models of financial distress, utilizing factors like operational revenue/expense patterns, sources of revenue, metrics of liquidity and leverage, enrollment/staff patterns, and ...
Journal Article
Are state and local revenue systems becoming obsolete?
As recently as a year ago, state governments were awash in revenue, but reports from state revenue officials suggest that growth in tax receipts has slowed considerably in recent quarters. The flow of tax revenues into state coffers has decelerated primarily because the economy has suffered a severe shock (it was weakening even before September 11) and delayed tax cuts enacted in earlier, more prosperous times have taken full effect. However, many tax analysts believe that long-term economic, technological, and political trends are also partially responsible and will continue to constrain ...
Journal Article
Reserve banks return more than $34 billion to Treasury
In 2007, the Federal Reserve System transferred more than $34 billion to the U.S. Treasury. This revenue represents most of the Reserve Banks' net income and came from a number of sources.
Report
The linkage between regional economic indexes and tax bases: evidence from New York
This paper examines the linkage between economic activity and tax revenues for New York State and New York City. Drawing upon the methodology of Stock and Watson, we use a dynamic single-factor model to estimate indexes of coincident economic indicators. We also construct measures of the sales and withholding tax bases. To conduct an empirical analysis of the relationship between the indexes of economic activity and the tax base series, we use vector autoregression and error correction models. The results provide strong evidence that the coincident indexes contain useful information for ...
Journal Article
How the U.S. tax system stacks up against other G-7 economies
The recent financial crisis, Europe?s sovereign debt problems and the U.S. political dispute about raising the national debt ceiling have prompted fiscal policy debate about the size of government and the type of tax structure needed to fund public expenditures. ; Government revenue of the so-called Group of Seven (G-7) largest industrialized nations expressed as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) from 1970 to 2009 generally trended upward before stabilizing in the 1990s (Chart 1). Revenue averaged 27 percent of GDP in 1970, rising to 36 percent in 2009. Over the past four decades, ...
Journal Article
Federal health care law promises coverage for all, but at a price
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, better known as health care reform, was signed into law last March. The measure ostensibly provides health care coverage to almost all Americans while simultaneously reducing the deficit by $143 billion over 10 years and by a greater amount over the longer term.
Journal Article
Will the current boom encourage states to spend too much?
Journal Article
Municipal finance in the face of falling property values