Should Robots be Taxed?

Joao Guerreiro, Sergio Rebelo, Pedro Teles

NBER Working Paper No. 23806
Issued in September 2017, Revised in April 2018
NBER Program(s):Economic Fluctuations and Growth, Public Economics

We use a model of automation to show that with the current U.S. tax system, a fall in automation costs could lead to a massive rise in income inequality. This inequality can be reduced by raising marginal income tax rates and taxing robots. But this solution involves a substantial efficiency loss for the reduced level of inequality. A Mirrleesian optimal income tax can reduce inequality at a smaller efficiency cost, but is difficult to implement. An alternative approach is to amend the current tax system to include a lump-sum rebate. In our model, with the rebate in place, it is optimal to tax robots only when there is partial automation.

You may purchase this paper on-line in .pdf format from SSRN.com ($5) for electronic delivery.

Acknowledgments

Machine-readable bibliographic record - MARC, RIS, BibTeX

Document Object Identifier (DOI): 10.3386/w23806

Users who downloaded this paper also downloaded* these: