For instance, consider Nadiri and Mamuneas (1994), which concludes that the social rate of return on public research and development is 7.18% when ignoring the
marginal excess burden cost of taxation, but can be as low as 4.92% when adjusted for estimates of the deadweight cost of the U.S.
This will imply shifting the pattern of revenue-raising towards ecotaxes, up until the point where the
marginal excess burden of each ecotax has risen to equal the
marginal excess burden from other taxes.
"The Relationship between the Marginal Cost of Public Funds and
Marginal Excess Burden." American Economic Review, 80, June 1990, 557-66.
The slope of the isoexcess-burden curve is equal to the ratio of the
marginal excess burden of the two taxes (note the similarity with isoquant/indifference curve analysis).
The data are used to estimate the
marginal excess burdens of tax reform and the estimates are then grouped into population deciles.