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Title
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CRESUS : measuring and mobilizing wealth for a cohesive, inclusive and fair society
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Author
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Abstract
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| At the start of the CRESUS project we knew quite a lot about the distribution of market and disposable incomes in Belgium, yet mostly relying on survey data, while we knew hardly anything about the distribution of net wealth. Thanks to the research carried out in the framework of the CRESUS project we now know much more about the distributions of net wealth and intergenerational transfers and of the share of top incomes, based on fiscal data, as well as the extent to which income and wealth go hand in hand. We have used this information to calculate poverty, inequality and redistribution indicators based on the joint distribution of income and wealth, to describe (optimal) wealth taxation from a theoretical and empirical perspective and to analyse the impact of wealth in social policies such as MIP schemes, asset-building policies, public pensions and long-term care provision. Our results lead to many interesting policy recommendations such as the need to complement existing social indicators with indicators including information on wealth, the fact that it is optimal to tax capital income at non-zero rates and equally across all types of income and that together with the inheritance & gift tax it should form a broad-based comprehensive tax system, that wealth is an important factor to consider in the awarding of social benefits as well as the way in which benefits are provided, that long-term care insurance schemes should be based on a deductible and that pension reforms should be announced early so that people have sufficient time to adapt their private savings accordingly. |
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Language
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English
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Publication
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Brussels
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Belgian Science Policy Office
,
2019
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Volume/pages
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68 p.
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Full text (open access)
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