论文标题
最低工资和最佳重新分配
Minimum Wages and Optimal Redistribution
论文作者
论文摘要
本文分析了是否应使用最低工资来重新分配税收和转让。我使用具有积极的公司利润的劳动力市场的经验扎根的模式来表征具有三种政策工具的最佳重新分配 - 劳动所得税和转让，公司所得税和最低工资。当最低工资增加了低技能劳动力市场参与者的平均税后工资以及公司利润发病率很大时，可以提高社会福利。当与税收一起选择时，最低工资可以通过防止公司捕获诸如EITC等低工资收入补贴（例如EITC），并享受无法通过不受支持行业的资本出行而无法通过公司税重新分配的高利润来帮助政府有效地重新分配低技能工人。事件研究表明，在过去二十年中，美国州级最低工资改革的平均最低工资改革增加了低技能劳动力市场参与者的平均税后工资，并降低了受影响行业的公司利润，即低技能劳动力密集型服务。足够的统计分析表明，在当前税收和转移系统下，美国最低工资通常保持在其最佳之下。
This paper analyzes whether a minimum wage should be used for redistribution on top of taxes and transfers. I characterize optimal redistribution for a government with three policy instruments -- labor income taxes and transfers, corporate income taxes, and a minimum wage -- using an empirically grounded model of the labor market with positive firm profits. A minimum wage can increase social welfare when it increases the average post-tax wages of low-skill labor market participants and when corporate profit incidence is large. When chosen together with taxes, the minimum wage can help the government redistribute efficiently to low-skill workers by preventing firms from capturing low-wage income subsidies such as the EITC and from enjoying high profits that cannot be redistributed via corporate taxes due to capital mobility in unaffected industries. Event studies show that the average US state-level minimum wage reform over the last two decades increased average post-tax wages of low-skilled labor market participants and reduced corporate profits in affected industries, namely low-skill labor-intensive services. A sufficient statistics analysis implies that US minimum wages typically remain below their optimum under the current tax and transfer system.
