The Effects of Tax Changes on Economic Activity: A Narrative Approach to Frequent Anticipations

Abstract

This paper studies the effects of anticipations of tax changes in the USA through the release of tax news in the media. I construct a new measure that captures the anticipation of tax bill approvals by exploiting the content of news in the US television. Since this information typically flows faster than standard measures of GDP, I propose a mixed frequency dynamic factor model to estimate both the economic activity latent factor and the effects of anticipated tax shocks on it. I find that onemonth-ahead media anticipations of tax approvals significantly stimulate current economic activity. This stimulation comes from anticipations of tax cuts.

Keywords: fiscal policy, taxation, mass media, information, beliefs, random forests

JEL Classification: E62, H20, N12, D80