Cutting taxes and achieving higher economic growth, as a result, is every politician’s dream. The 2016 parliamentary elections of Georgia showed just how important and controversial the question of taxation can become.

Shakespeare is often quoted as having said that death and tax are the only two certainties in life; many people of the modern world would perhaps agree that he would have been at liberty to add tax evasion to the list.

Consumer Demand Analysis for a Private Company, JSC Sarajishvili. 2015 increase in alcohol excise taxes has led to price increase on majority of JSC Sarajishvili’s products. As a consequence the company experienced sharp decline in sales of its products.

When thinking of “market distortions” we typically imagine government regulations, taxes, and subsidies that prevent market mechanisms from achieving an optimal outcome. For example, if you pay $100 for a 30-minute taxi ride (as is the case in many European capitals), you can easily relate it to a government regulation requiring all taxi drivers to be licensed (at a very high cost). In the absence of such a requirement, many more drivers would be able to enter the taxi driving profession, increasing supply and reducing prices.

End of the week –and a fresh serving of interesting links from economist bloggers and blogging economists. 1.  Joe Weisenthal from the Business Insider tells us how Ben Bernanke murdered the gold standard – and good riddance too! 2.  Nice infographics from Turbotax on the history of taxes in the US. 3.  Econbrowser discusses the prospects of the Eurozone crisis. 4.  Michael Sandel talks about market thinking from an unusual point of view. Quite illuminating, in a way. 5.  The Free Exchange blog explains (or tries to explain) several of America’s macro puzzles. As usual, excellent read. 6.  Noahpinion talks about an interesting model of asset bubbles. 7.  A very nice piece on heterogeneity from the Minneapolis Fed. 8.  Some stabs in the back of libertarianism from Noahpinion again. Couldn’t agree more, really. 9.  Witty counterfactual from our old friend, Worthwhile Canadian Initiative. 10. And from him again, something useful for those who like myself teach macro – problems with teaching SRAS shocks