The Effects of Tax Changes on Economic Activity: A Narrative Approach to Frequent Anticipations

Abstract

Abstract This paper studies the effects of anticipations of tax changes on economic activity through the release of tax news in the media in the United States. I provide a measure of anticipations by exploiting the content of television news. This information typically flows faster than standard measures of gross domestic product, thus I propose a mixed frequency dynamic factor model to estimate both the economic activity latent factor and the effects of anticipated tax shocks on it. I find that one-month-ahead anticipations of tax cuts significantly stimulate current economic activity while those of tax increases produce the opposite effect.

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