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WSJ PRINTS SHAVIRO TRIBUTE TO BRADFORD

March 01, 2005

The Wall Street Journal today runs a tribute to tax economist David Bradford, who died last week of injuries suffered in a fire. The piece was authored by tax blogger Daniel Shaviro. It is available here to WSJ online subscribers.

While the TaxProf blog and others had noted Mr. Bradford's passing, I didn't really appreciate his impact on the tax field before reading the Shaviro tribute. From the Shaviro article:

When people think of replacing the income tax with a consumption tax that can achieve whatever level of progressivity one prefers, they think of two main models. The first, sometimes called a consumed income tax, structurally resembles our present system for taxing individuals, except that people get unlimited savings accounts, like IRAs, contributions to which may be deducted while withdrawals are taxed. During his time at the Treasury Department in the 1970s, David developed what is still by far the best prototype for such a system: the so-called "Blueprints" cash flow tax that he discussed in detail in his landmark study, "Blueprints for Tax Reform."

The other main prototype, involving a business-level as well as an individual-level tax, has as its best-known exemplar the Hall-Rabushka flat tax (after the economists Robert Hall and Alvin Rabushka), which I believe David helped inspire.

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