EC 2450A Public Economics and Fiscal Policy I

Semester: 

Fall

Offered: 

2022

Hello!  Very glad you are interested in this class!

Who is teaching? I am Stefanie Stantcheva: sstantcheva@fas.harvard.edu and our great teaching assistant is Michael Droste: mdroste@fas.harvard.edu.

Class time: The class meets Mondays and Wednesdays 1:30-2:45 pm in Littauer 301.

Course content:  This is a graduate course in public economics, intended primarily for
graduate students in the Department of Economics and those in the Business Economics and
PEG programs. Other students with preparation in microeconomic theory and econometrics
can inquire with me whether the course is suitable for them. The course is technical. It
will cover core topics in the field of public economics, through a combination of theoretical
models and empirical work. We will cover classical work, as well as new, frontier research.

Lecture notes:  I will post lecture notes on Canvas every week the day before or on the day of the class.

Reading List: The Reading List for each lecture will be at the back of the slides' set.
Papers are linked and we will post them in Canvas too. Strongly recommended readings
are in bold. The other readings are there for you to know what the most relevant literature
is and to pursue further if the topic is of interest to you.

There is no textbook for this class, but a useful guide on (almost) all the topics we
will cover is available in the Handbook of Public Economics available through the Harvard
libraries (electronically too).

Course requirements: To complete this course, you will have to 1) write a referee report
on a paper that will be assigned; 2) write a paper proposal on a topic of interest to you in
public economics; and 3) take a 2 hour final exam at the end of the semester.

Office Hours:  Tuesdays 6-7 pm, starting after Labor Day. Office hours are over zoom.
Sign-up in google sheet below, feel free to sign up as a group or agree between yourselves
to come in groups; you can mark "alone" if you want to have that slot alone (so others
don't show up during that time) or "ok with others" if you are ok with others just dropping in and listening or chatting. Pets, babies, friends, roommates welcome during office hours.
The excel sheet has the zoom link. If you need a slot and there are none left, email me, I will add more slots until 7:30 pm.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1H-A6WyDjhUeaOquma-C4hhbmkoDgrQk3...

Mike’s Office Hours: Mike will set his office hours.

Syllabus

LECTURE NOTES

Introduction

Optimal Income Taxation

Optimal Transfers

Empirical Responses -- Labor Supply 

Taxable Income Elasticities and Broader Effects of Taxation

Tax Enforcement

Social Preferences: Theory

Social Preferences: Empirics

Social Preferences: Survey Methods

New Dynamic Public Finance

Capital Taxation

Zero-sum slides

Climate change slides

Referee Report (due October 12th): Guide to Writing Referee Reports

Paper Proposal (due December 10th): Paper Proposal (due December 10th):