front cover of How the Financial Crisis and Great Recession Affected Higher Education
How the Financial Crisis and Great Recession Affected Higher Education
Edited by Jeffrey R. Brown and Caroline M. Hoxby
University of Chicago Press, 2014
The recent financial crisis had a profound effect on both public and private universities, which faced shrinking endowments, declining charitable contributions, and reductions in government support. Universities responded to these stresses in different ways. This volume presents new evidence on the nature of these responses, and on how the incentives and constraints facing different institutions affected their behavior. 
           
The studies in this volume explore how various practices at institutions of higher education, such as the drawdown of endowment resources, the awarding of financial aid, and spending on research, responded to the financial crisis. The studies examine universities as economic organizations that operate in a complex institutional and financial environment. The authors examine the role of endowments in university finances and the interaction of spending policies, asset allocation strategies, and investment opportunities. They demonstrate that universities’ behavior can be modeled using economic principles.
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front cover of Social Security Policy in a Changing Environment
Social Security Policy in a Changing Environment
Edited by Jeffrey R. Brown, Jeffrey B. Liebman, and David A. Wise
University of Chicago Press, 2009
Social Security Policy in a Changing Environment analyzes the changing economic and demographic environment in which social insurance programs that benefit elderly households will operate.  It also explores how these ongoing trends will affect future beneficiaries, under both the current social security program and potential reform options.    In this volume, an esteemed group of economists probes the challenge posed to Social Security by an aging population.  The researchers examine trends in private sector retirement saving and health care costs, as well as the uncertain nature of future demographic, economic, and social trends—including marriage and divorce rates and female participation in the labor force. Recognizing the ambiguity of the environment in which the Social Security system must operate and evolve, this landmark book explores factors that policymakers must consider in designing policies that are resilient enough to survive in an economically and demographically uncertain society.
 
 
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front cover of Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 24
Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 24
Edited by Jefferey R. Brown
University of Chicago Press Journals, 2010

Tax Policy and the Economy publishes current academic research findings on taxation and government spending that have both immediate bearing on policy debates and longer-term interest. The papers in this volume range from topics as broad as the relative efficacy of tax cuts versus spending increases as a form of economic stimulus to a targeted analysis of the Low Income Housing Tax Credit. Also included are two papers at that examine different aspects of policies designed to provide fiscal stimulus, as well as an examination of the effects of recent reforms in the Earned Income Tax Credit.

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front cover of Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 25
Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 25
Edited by Jeffrey R. Brown
University of Chicago Press Journals, 2011
In light of the very public debate on the federal budget this year between Democrats and Republicans, the economic ramifications of tax policy are now more than ever a focus of national attention. Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 25 is thus an invaluable tool, publishing current academic research findings on taxation and government spending, which informs important policy debates with rigorous economic analysis. The papers in Volume 25 include a review of current fuel economy taxation; research on implicit taxes on work from Social Security and Medicare; an analysis on how future increases in aggregate health care expenditures will impact future tax rates required to support Medicare and Medicaid; and two papers that analyze the implications of large and sustained budget deficits on the economy.
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front cover of Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 26
Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 26
Edited by Jeffrey R. Brown
University of Chicago Press Journals, 2012
There is no question that the US is facing significant fiscal challenges. Tax Policy and the Economy research papers make valuable contributions to our understanding of the economic effects of alternative approaches. The papers collected in Volume 26 include a study of an important determinant of the labor supply effects of Social Security; an examination of the budgetary and economic impact of changing how employer health insurance is treated in the tax code; an analysis of how US investment in Europe might be impacted by proposed corporate tax reform in the European Union; a look at the term “tax expenditures,” often used to describe governmental policies that show as reduction in taxes rather than as an increase in spending. The final paper in the volume shows how uncertainty about the restoration of US fiscal balance imposes additional efficiency costs on the economy in consumption, saving, labor supply and portfolio decisions, and how it reduces individual welfare.
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front cover of Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 27
Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 27
Edited by Jeffrey R. Brown
University of Chicago Press Journals, 2013
Taxation policy was a central part of the policy debates over the “fiscal cliff.” Given the importance of fiscal issues, it is vital for rigorous empirical research to inform the policy dialogue.  In keeping with the NBER’s tradition of carrying out rigorous but policy-relevant research, Volume 27 of Tax Policy and the Economy offers insights on a number of key tax policy questions.  This year's volume features six papers by leading scholars who examine the tax treatment of tuition at private K-12 schools, the potential streamlining of the federal rules for post-secondary financial aid and the use of tax return information in this process, the effect of tax and benefit programs on incentives to work, the macroeconomic effects of fiscal adjustments, and the set of factors that contributed to the weakening US fiscal outlook in the last decade.
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front cover of Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 28
Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 28
Edited by Jeffrey R. Brown
University of Chicago Press Journals, 2014
The papers in Volume 28 of Tax Policy and the Economy illustrate the depth and breadth of the research by NBER research associates who study taxation and government spending programs.  The first paper explores whether closely held firms are used as tax shelters. The second examines the taxation of multinational corporations. The third discusses the taxation of housing, focusing on the ways in which current income tax rules may affect location and consumption decisions and lead to economic inefficiencies. The fourth paper offers an historical perspective on the political economy of gasoline taxes, with a particular focus on the response to the oil shocks of the early 1970s. The fifth and final paper uses the tools of financial economics to estimate the unfunded liabilities of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation.
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front cover of Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 29
Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 29
Edited by Jeffrey R. Brown
University of Chicago Press Journals, 2016
The papers in Volume 29 of Tax Policy and the Economy illustrate the depth and breadth of the taxation-related research by NBER research associates, both in terms of methodological approach and in terms of topics.  In the first paper, former NBER President Martin Feldstein estimates how much revenue the federal government could raise by limiting tax expenditures in various ways, such as capping deductions and exclusions. The second paper, by George Bulman and Caroline Hoxby, makes use of a substantial expansion in the availability of education tax credits in 2009 to study whether tax credits have a significant causal effect on college attendance and related outcomes. In the third paper, Casey Mulligan discusses how the Affordable Care Act (ACA) introduces or expands taxes on income and on full-time employment. In the fourth paper, Bradley Heim, Ithai Lurie, and Kosali Simon focus on the “young adult” provision of the ACA that allows young adults to be covered by their parents’ insurance policies. They find no meaningful effects of this provision on labor market outcomes.  The fifth paper, by Louis Kaplow, identifies some of the key conceptual challenges to analyzing social insurance policies, such as Social Security, in a context where shortsighted individuals fail to save adequately for their retirement. 
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front cover of Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 30
Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 30
Edited by Jeffrey R. Brown
University of Chicago Press Journals, 2016
The research papers in Volume 30 of Tax Policy and the Economy make significant contributions to the academic literature in public finance and provide important conceptual and empirical input to policy design. In the first paper, Gerald Carlino and Robert Inman consider whether state-level fiscal policies create spillovers for neighboring states and how federal stimulus can internalize these externalities. The second paper, by Nathan Hendren, presents a new framework for evaluating the welfare consequences of tax policy changes and explains how the key parameters needed to implement this framework can be estimated. The third paper, a collaborative effort by several academic and US Treasury economists, documents the dramatic increase in pass-through businesses, including partnerships and S-corporations, over the last thirty years.  It notes that these entities now generate more than half of all US business income. The fourth paper examines property tax compliance using a pseudo-randomized experiment in Philadelphia, in which those who owed taxes received supplemental letters regarding their tax delinquency. The research explores what types of communication lead to higher rates of tax payment. In the fifth paper, Jeffrey Clemens discusses cross-program budgetary spillovers of minimum wage regulations. Severin Borenstein and Lucas Davis, the authors of the sixth paper, study the distributional effects of income tax credits for clean energy.
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