Abstract

The economic literature shows how economic efficiency can be enhanced through the reduction of fiscal distortion. In this context, this paper assesses the overall neutrality of both theoretical and existing fiscal systems concerning capital income taxation. The newly adopted methodology is simple and can be used by policy makers to design practical fiscal systems, which are often a combination of different level of taxes and tax bases. To benefit from the advantages of the nominal system, together with the real accounting (derived adjusting the balance sheets' entries for inflation), we build a rigorous nominal accounting system (adding the appropriate budget entries) that can achieve similar results. Our analysis allows us to underline the conditions of financial and real neutrality, as well as the changes needed in order to make existing fiscal schemes neutral.