Homestead portability: Equity and tax base effects of Florida's Amendment One

In 2008, Amendment One changed homeowners' incentives to move within the state of Florida. In particular, people who had been unwilling to move due to previously accrued tax savings suddenly found moving less costly. Amendment One also had implications for the equity of the property tax across both individual homeowners and areas within the state.;This dissertation is divided into three studies. The first two use publicly available empirical data and the third uses a laboratory experiment. The first study analyzes the effect of homestead portability on the tax base of individual homes then takes two approaches to decide if homeowners who use their Amendment One tax savings when they move to a new home end up free riding. The last part of the chapter examines how geographically concentrated moves with Amendment One savings are relative to total moves. The second study examines questions of equity of the tax both at the individual and jurisdictional levels. Various components of the tax structure are examined at the individual level, including effects of Amendment One. Jurisdictional analysis focuses on the aggregate number of homes purchased with Amendment One savings and the total tax savings thereby conferred. The final study is an experiment designed to examine moving behavior. Namely it examines if the presence or absence of the incentive to move provided by Amendment One causes moving behavior to be different and whether the rate of moves will be permanently or temporarily increased.