This dissertation consists of three essays examining the effect of Michigan's assessment growth limit and assessment practices on property tax equity in Michigan and Detroit. The first essay evaluates the extent to which Michigan's assessment growth cap has redistributed tax payments across economic and demographic groups throughout Michigan. Using survey data collected in the winter of 2008 and summer of 2012, I show the length of homeownership is negatively correlated with the homeowner's effective property tax rate. I also document a regressive relationship between income and effective tax rates. Finally, a relationship between age and effective tax rates emerges in 2012 - older homeowners enjoy reduced rates. The second essay evaluates the degree to which the assessment growth cap has created substantial differences in effective tax rates among residential properties within the City of Detroit. Using parcel-level tax data collected from the City of Detroit's assessment division, results show the cap creates substantial horizontal and vertical inequities. An important potential implication of the cap is that it may constrain mobility; these concerns are validated as I measure the "lock-in" effect created by the cap. In the final essay, I examine property tax inequity created by assessment practices in Detroit. Using the same parcel-level data from essay 2, I show that current assessment practices create a wide range of property tax payments across properties of similar value, and similar tax payments for properties of different values.
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