Taxation of the family

<p>This paper examines in some detail the question of whether married couples should be taxed individually or jointly. The present system and most of the options which have been discussed recently contain elements of both. No one system satisfies all aims and in the end which system should be adopted will depend on decisions as to the relative importance of various objectives. These objectives involve a wide range of incentive, equity and administrative considerations. Towards the end of the paper, we attempt to evaluate the competing options in terms of these objectives.</p>