Code for: "Bunching to Maximize Tax Credits: Evidence from Kinks in the U.S. Tax Schedule"

Principal Investigator(s): View help for Principal Investigator(s) Jacob Mortenson, Joint Committee on Taxation, U.S. Congress; Andrew Whitten, Office of Tax Analysis, U.S. Department of the Treasury

Version: View help for Version V1

Name	File Type	Size	Last Modified
All_Count_Bunchers.do	text/x-stata-syntax	14.2 KB	07/10/2019 07:33:AM
All_Count_Bunchers_online_appendix.do	text/x-stata-syntax	17.5 KB	07/10/2019 07:33:AM
All_Count_RefMaxers.do	text/x-stata-syntax	13.6 KB	07/10/2019 07:33:AM
All_Count_Trackers.do	text/x-stata-syntax	17.3 KB	07/10/2019 07:33:AM
BFK_Counter.do	text/x-stata-syntax	1.4 KB	07/10/2019 07:33:AM
BFK_OurCalc.do	text/x-stata-syntax	2.5 KB	07/10/2019 07:33:AM
CTC2_Counter.do	text/x-stata-syntax	3.4 KB	07/10/2019 07:33:AM
CTC2_OurCalc.do	text/x-stata-syntax	7.4 KB	07/10/2019 07:33:AM
Clean_Combined_Sample1.do	text/x-stata-syntax	45.1 KB	07/10/2019 07:33:AM
Clean_Combined_Sample2.do	text/x-stata-syntax	47.8 KB	07/10/2019 07:33:AM

Project Citation:

Mortenson, Jacob, and Whitten, Andrew. Code for: “Bunching to Maximize Tax Credits: Evidence from Kinks in the U.S. Tax Schedule.” Nashville, TN: American Economic Association [publisher], 2020. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2020-07-23. https://doi.org/10.3886/E110661V1

Project Description

Summary: We explore bunching at U.S. income tax kinks using a panel of 258 million tax returns from 1996 to 2014. We find bunching at seven kinks, with nearly all bunching occurring at kinks maximizing tax credits. In our sample period, the total number of bunchers increased at an 10.9 percent annualized growth rate, from 134,300 in 1996 to 866,600 in 2014. Approximately two-thirds of these bunchers locate at the unique point that maximizes refunds. Some taxpayers repeatedly bunch at this point, even in consecutive years when different tax kinks are refund-maximizing.

Scope of Project

Subject Terms: Bunching; tax credits; income tax

JEL Classification:
      H23 Externalities • Redistributive Effects • Environmental Taxes and Subsidies
      H24 Personal Income and Other Nonbusiness Taxes and Subsidies
      H26 Tax Evasion and Avoidance
      H31 Household
      J22 Time Allocation and Labor Supply

Geographic Coverage: United States

Time Period(s): 1996 – 2014

Data Type(s): program source code

Methodology

Data Source: IRS tax filings

Collection Mode(s): other

Unit(s) of Observation: Tax unit, year pair.

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Published Versions

V1 [2020-07-23]

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