Abstract:
In the last forty years, social science research has demonstrated that individuals care significantly about relative ("positional") economic well-being and that gains in private income and/or consumption thereby cast a negative externality on other individuals whose own income and/or consumption declines in relative terms. To resolve the externality, a progressive income or consumption tax has been advocated. In this dissertation I present three papers that critically analyze tax progressivity as a response to positional externalities.
