Government Information Transparency

47 Pages Posted: 24 May 2009

See all articles by Facundo Albornoz

Facundo Albornoz

University of Birmingham

Joan Maria Esteban

Autonomous University of Barcelona

Paolo Vanin

University of Bologna - Department of Economics

Date Written: May 14, 2009

Abstract

This paper studies a model of announcements by a privately informed government about the future state of the economic activity in an economy subject to recurrent shocks and with distortions due to income taxation. Although transparent communication would ex ante be desirable, we find that even a benevolent government may ex-post be non-informative, in an attempt to countervail the tax distortion with a 'second best' compensating distortion in information. This result provides a rationale for independent national statistical offices, committed to truthful communication. We also find that whether inequality in income distribution favors or harms government transparency depends on labor supply elasticity.

Suggested Citation

Albornoz, Facundo and Esteban, Joan Maria and Vanin, Paolo, Government Information Transparency (May 14, 2009). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1407162 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1407162

Facundo Albornoz (Contact Author)

University of Birmingham ( email )

Economics Department
Birmingham, B15 2TT
United Kingdom

Joan Maria Esteban

Autonomous University of Barcelona ( email )

Campus UAB
E-08193 Bellaterra
Spain
34 93 580 6612 (Phone)
34 93 580 1452 (Fax)

Paolo Vanin

University of Bologna - Department of Economics ( email )

Piazza Scaravilli 2
Bologna, BO 40126
Italy
+39-0512098120 (Phone)
+39-0512098040 (Fax)

HOME PAGE: http://https://sites.google.com/site/paolovanin/

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