the tax. The area represented by the triangle results from the fact that the intersection of the supply and the demand curves are cut short. The consumer surplus and the producer surplus are also cut short. The loss of such surplus is never recouped and represents the deadweight loss. Some economists like Martin Feldstein maintain that these triangles can seriously affect long-term economic trends by pivoting the trend downwards and causing a magnification of losses in the long run but others like James Tobin have argued that they do not have a huge impact on the economy. Hicks vs. Marshall It is important to make a distinction between the Hicksian (per John Hicks) and the Marshallian (per Alfred Marshall) demand function as it relates to deadweight loss. After the consumer surplus is considered, it can be shown that the Marshallian deadweight loss is zero if demand is perfectly elastic or supply is perfectly inelastic. However, Hicks analyzed the situation through indifference curves and noted that when the Marshallian demand curve is perfectly inelastic, the policy or economic situation that caused a distortion in relative prices has a substitution effect, i.e. is a deadweight loss. In modern economic literature, the most common measure of a taxpayer's loss from a distortionary tax, such as a tax on bicycles, is the equivalent variation, the maximum amount that a taxpayer would be willing to forgo in a lump sum to avoid the distortionary tax. The deadweight loss can then be interpreted as the difference between the equivalent variation and the revenue raised by the tax. The difference is attributable to the behavioral changes induced by a distortionary tax that are measured by a substitution effect. However, that is not the only interpretation, and Lind and Granqvist (2010) point out that Pigou did not use a lump sum tax as the point of reference to discuss deadweight loss (excess burden). Deadweight loss of taxation When a tax is levied on buyers, the demand curve shifts downward in accordance with the size of the tax. Similarly, when tax is levied on sellers, the supply curve shifts upward by the size of tax. When the tax is imposed, the price paid by buyers increases, and the price received by seller decreases. Therefore, buyers and sellers share the burden of the tax, regardless of how it is imposed. Since a tax places a "wedge" between the price buyers