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Economics 286W
Honors Seminar

 

 

Spring 2004
Wednesdays, 2-4
Koons Hall 311
R. N. Langlois
322 Monteith X63472

Office hours MW 9-12 and 1-2 or by appointment

Assignment 5

Our next faculty presenter, Metin Cosgel, will talk about the economics of taxation in the Ottoman Empire in the Sixteenth Century.  

 

For the most part, the Empire maintained a fairly consistent and uniform system of taxation throughout its varied dominions, even though it tended to adapt existing systems in the lands it conquered.  One exception seems to have been in parts of the Levant – the area of Palestine, southern Syria, and the Transjordan.  Here taxation was discriminatory, with some villages paying at a higher rate than others.

 

Consider the problem of discriminatory taxation both in general and in the context of the Levant of the Sixteenth Century.  Is it ever efficient to tax in a discriminatory manner?  What reasons other than efficiency might motivate a government to tax in a discriminatory manner?  Discuss and critically analyze Metin’s findings about the causes, efficiency, and distributional effects of discriminatory taxation in the Ottoman Levant. 

 

You might find the following readings helpful:

 

·        Metin Cosgel, “The Economics of Ottoman Taxation,” Working Paper 2004-02, Department of Economics, University of Connecticut.

 

·        Metin Cosgel, “Taxes, Efficiency, and Redistribution: Discriminatory Taxation of Villages in Ottoman Palestine, Southern Syria and Transjordan in the Sixteenth Century,” Working Paper 2002-22, Department of Economics, University of Connecticut.

 

·        Randall G. Holcombe, “Tax Policy from a Public Choice Perspective,” National Tax Journal 51(2): 359-371 (1998).  (Available on WebCT, or you can search for this journal online through the UConn Library site.)

                                                                                                                                                                                    

Due: April 14.