Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research - Research Publications
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ItemIntergenerational correlation of labor market outcomes(Springer US, 2016-03-01)This paper contributes to the relatively limited literature on the correlation of labor market outcomes of parents and their children. This literature is relevant to the larger literature on intergenerational income mobility since correlation in intergenerational labor market outcomes is one of the potential factors contributing to the intergenerational correlation of permanent incomes. In this paper, we consider the time spent in unemployment by both sons and daughters, while accounting for the potential endogeneity of education. Using the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia data, we find evidence of a positive correlation of labor market outcomes between fathers and sons and, to a lesser extent, between mothers and daughters. In addition, the results reveal a significant relationship between parents’ and children’s education levels, indicating that there is an indirect association of parental education with their children’s labor market outcomes through education.
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ItemExplaining the equalising effect of panel-income changes(De Gruyter, 2016-09-01)Panel-income changes tend to be equalising but existing approaches provide little insight on the nature of this equalising process. I present a new decomposition framework showing explicitly how the equalising effect of panel-income changes depends on the respective size and distribution of panel-income gains and losses. One of the new insights gained from the application to US data for the 1970/2009 period is that most of the equalising effect occurs through income gains rather than income losses even in times of recession.
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ItemRecent Trends in Income Redistribution in Australia: Can Changes in the Tax-Benefit System Account for the Decline in Redistribution?(Wiley, 2015-03-01)We examine trends in the redistributive impact of the tax-benefit system in Australia between 1994 and 2009 using a framework that allows us to separate the contributions of taxes, benefits, and taxes and benefits combined. Furthermore, we identify the effect of tax-benefit policy reforms on income redistribution over the period. We find that after reaching a peak value in the late 1990s, the redistributive effect of taxes and benefits declined sharply. Although reforms to the tax-benefit system contributed to the decline in redistribution, their contribution was limited compared to the role played by the changes in market income distribution.
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ItemUnderstanding Changes in the Distribution and Redistribution of Income: A Unifying Decomposition Framework(Wiley, 2016-06)In recent decades income inequality has increased in many developed countries but the role of tax and transfer reforms is often poorly understood. We propose a new method allowing for the decomposition of historical changes in income distribution and redistribution measures into: (i) the immediate effect of tax-transfer policy reforms in the absence of behavioral responses; (ii) the effect of labor supply responses induced by these reforms; and (iii) a third component allowing us to explore the effect of changes in the distribution of a wide range of determinants, including the effect of employment changes not induced by policy reforms. The application of the decomposition to Australia reveals that the direct effect of tax-transfer policy reforms accounts for half of the observed increase in income inequality between 1999 and 2008, while the increased dispersion of wages and capital incomes also played an important role.