The Trouble with Dynamic Scoring
3 Pages Posted: 24 Apr 2013
Date Written: April 15, 2013
Abstract
Republicans have long advocated dynamic scoring of the revenue effects of tax legislation, which means taking into account the macroeconomic consequences of tax changes. Revenue estimators already take behavioral effects into account to the best of their ability. I argue that this debate is less about increasing the accuracy of revenue estimating than institutionalizing the Republican view of taxes; making it easier to cut taxes and harder to raise them. Proof of this is that Republicans oppose using dynamic scoring to estimate the impact on the deficit of changes in federal outlays.
Keywords: dynamic scoring, Joint Committee on Taxation
JEL Classification: H20, K34
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation