Time Preference and Tax Burden Acceptance: Asymmetric Effects on Intertemporal and Contemporaneous Redistribution

Abstract

This paper examines the extent to which individual time preferences are associated with the willingness to accept different tax burdens. The first is an intertemporal redistribution in which a current consumption tax increase is exchanged for a proportional future reduction. The second is a contemporaneous redistribution where the tax burden borne by individuals is transferred directly to those with significantly lower incomes than their own. Using a cross-sectional online survey of approximately 12,000 observations, we found through various regression analyses that higher time preference is negatively associated with acceptance in both domains. Crucially, the negative coefficient is larger in absolute value for contemporaneous redistribution than for the intertemporal one.