The course centres on the economic principles underlying the design of good tax systems, as well as the working principles of a tax system in a market economy. The main objective is to provide students with a conceptual framework to analyse the effects of taxation on agents’ (individuals, firms) behaviour and to use this framework to evaluate alternative tax systems. Both theoretical and applied economic tools will be used to explore various issues of tax policy and a great emphasis will be put on bridging the gap between theory and applied cases. The course covers topics as tax incidence, the impact of income taxation on labour supply, the effects of corporate taxes on firms' investment and funding decisions, optimal tax systems. These issues are studied with reference to the main OECD countries with an emphasis on the tax reforms enacted or proposed in recent years. At the end of the course students should:
1. have a knowledge of the structure of the tax system in Italy and other OECD countries
2. have an understanding of the key behavioural effects of taxes on individuals’ decisions (labour supply) and firm activity (investments, financing choices, profits distribution)
3. be able to discuss, using relevant economic concepts and methods, a number of issues in tax policy, and the relative pros and cons of alternative tax systems.
