@article{EssaysonInequality:1418,
      recid = {1418},
      author = {Henry de Frahan, Lancelot},
      title = {Essays on Inequality, Fairness and Taxation},
      publisher = {The University of Chicago},
      school = {Ph.D.},
      address = {2018-12},
      pages = {166},
      abstract = {This dissertation is a collection of two essays on  inequality.  The first chapter takes a normative approach  to inequality.  We start from the normative assumption that  not all inequalities are unjust.  In particular, we assume  that public policy ought to correct inequalities that are  caused by differences in skills insofar as they generate  poverty but ought to remain neutral towards inequalities  generated by different individual preferences over labor  choices.  We construct social preferences that are  consistent with this view in addition to satisfying Pareto  efficiency and we derive implications for the taxation of  labor income.  We calibrate the optimal tax formula to the  US and compare it to the current tax and transfer system.  One of the most striking features of the optimal tax  schedule under these social preferences is the desirability  of negative marginal tax rates on low-incomes.  Overall,  the US tax and transfer system shares many features with  the tax scheme that would be designed by a planner whose  objective combines reducing poverty with preference  responsibility.

The second chapter takes an  intergenerational perspective on inequality.  We measure  intergenerational mobility in housing consumption - across  surnames - in the US for the period 1940-2012.  We  translate, under stated assumptions, the figure into an  estimated family-level intergenerational elasticity of  total consumption of 0.6-0.67 between two successive  generations.  We also document that blacks have much lower  IGE than whites, the Northeast has higher IGE than the  South and Midwest, and in particular, the black-white gap  in IGE is concentrated in the Northeast.  Some of these  patterns contrast with the previous literature's analysis  of IGE in labor income.  We discuss possible mechanisms  behind the level of - and the heterogeneity in - the  estimated IGE of consumption.},
      url = {http://knowledge.uchicago.edu/record/1418},
      doi = {https://doi.org/10.6082/uchicago.1418},
}