Working Paper
Quantifying the impacts of expanding social protection on efficiency and equity
A large informal sector is a challenge for developing countries building up social protection systems. Expanding social safety nets reduces poverty, but financing them can increase the tax burden, potentially reducing availability of formal sector...
Working Paper
Tax-benefit microsimulation and income redistribution in Ecuador
The aim of this paper is to explore the redistributive effects of taxes and benefits in Ecuador using two different approaches: direct use of reported taxes and benefits in household survey data, and use of simulated taxes and benefits obtained from...
Working Paper
Policy transparency in the public sector
A well functioning system of public service delivery requires the definition and measurement of eligibility for services to be determined in a transparent and non-discretionary manner. This paper uses the case of the Productive Social Safety Net in...
Report
SOUTHMOD Country Report Viet Nam - VNMOD v1.0
View the latest VNMOD country report here. This report documents VNMOD, the SOUTHMOD model developed for Viet Nam. This work was carried out by the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM) in collaboration with KU Leuven and the project...
Working Paper
Unemployment insurance and income protection in Ecuador
This paper explores the role of the recently introduced unemployment insurance benefit (seguro de desempleo) in protecting incomes in case of unemployment in Ecuador. We use ECUAMOD, the tax-benefit microsimulation model for Ecuador, to simulate...
Working Paper
The distributional impact of tax and benefit systems in six African countries
This paper assesses the effects of public policies on income taxes and benefits in six African countries. The comparative analysis focuses on the distribution and composition of incomes and assesses the effect of these policies on inequality and...
Working Paper
Tax-benefit microsimulation model in developing countries
This study aims to expand the use of tax-benefit microsimulation tools in Indonesia. In particular, it reviews the feasibility of expanding SOUTHMOD, a tax-benefit microsimulation model being applied in developing countries that was developed based...
Report
SOUTHMOD country report Bolivia - BOLMOD v2.0
This report documents BOLMOD, the SOUTHMOD micrososimulation model developed for Bolivia. It describes the different tax–benefit policies in place, how the microsimulation model takes advantage of these different provisions, and the database on which...
Report
SOUTHMOD country report Colombia - COLMOD v2.3
This report documents COLMOD, the SOUTHMOD micrososimulation model developed for Colombia. It describes the different tax–benefit policies in place, how the microsimulation model takes advantage of these different provisions, and the database on...
Working Paper
Evaluating the impact of the 2023–2024 personal income tax reform in Rwanda
Establishing an equitable and efficient tax system is essential for reducing poverty, combating inequality, and fostering sustainable economic growth. Rwanda’s government has recognized this and implemented significant changes to the personal income...
Technical Note
Dealing with the oversimulation of taxes and benefits in SOUTHMOD microsimulation models
SOUTHMOD tax-benefit microsimulation models may in some cases oversimulate taxes or benefits, generating greater expenditure, a greater number of beneficiaries, or greater amounts of taxes or taxpayers than reported in administrative data. Drawing on...
Working Paper
Tax-benefit microsimulation model in Rwanda
This paper assesses the feasibility of developing a tax and benefit microsimulation model in Rwanda. Tax-benefit microsimulation can be used to explore ways in which national development goals can be achieved in a cost-effective manner, and to assess...
Working Paper
Social protection for working-age women in Tanzania
Tanzania has expanded its social protection framework significantly over the past decade, but the country continues to grapple with important gender inequalities. This paper examines, first, the evolution and effects of Tanzania’s social protection...
Report
SOUTHMOD country report Rwanda - RWAMOD v1.0
This report documents RWAMOD, the SOUTHMOD model developed for Rwanda. It describes the different tax-benefit policies in place, how the microsimulation model picks up these different provisions, and the database on which the model runs. It concludes...
Report
SOUTHMOD country report Viet Nam - VNMOD v3.3
This report documents VNMOD, the SOUTHMOD model developed for Viet Nam. This work has been carried out by the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM) in collaboration with UNU-WIDER and SASPRI. The results presented in this report are...
Report
SOUTHMOD country report Ecuador - ECUAMOD v4.2
This report documents ECUAMOD, the SOUTHMOD micrososimulation model developed for Ecuador. It describes the different tax–benefit policies in place, how the microsimulation model takes advantage of these different provisions, and the database on...
Report
SOUTHMOD country report Peru - PERUMOD v2.4
This report documents PERUMOD, the SOUTHMOD micrososimulation model developed for Peru. It describes the different tax–benefit policies in place, how the microsimulation model takes advantage of these different provisions, and the database on which...
Blog
Behind the scenes: Meet our tax-benefit microsimulation team in Viet Nam!
by
Anna Toppari
May 2022
How can Vietnamese policymakers improve their policy choices related to social protection and tax policies? Who are the experts providing evidence on...
Report
SOUTHMOD country report Viet Nam - VNMOD v2.3
View the latest VNMOD country report here. This report documents VNMOD, the SOUTHMOD model developed for Viet Nam. This work has been carried out by the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM) in collaboration with UNU-WIDER and SASPRI. The...
Working Paper
Microsimulation approaches to studying shocks and social protection in selected developing economies
This paper calculates automatic stabilization in Ghana, South Africa, and Ecuador to explain income cushioning amid income and demand shocks. Fiscal policies within these countries are also stress tested to gauge welfare contingencies and insurance...
Report
SOUTHMOD country report Ecuador - ECUAMOD v1.5
View the latest ECUAMOD country report here. This report documents ECUAMOD, the SOUTHMOD micrososimulation model developed for Ecuador. The report describes the different tax–benefit policies in place, how the microsimulation model takes advantage of...
Technical Note
Iterative proportional fitting for reweighting input data in SOUTHMOD microsimulation models
This note describes how the counterfactual datasets in the working paper by Lastunen et al. (2021) have been reweighted, for each country analysed, to the ‘pre-crisis’ time point of 31 March 2020. The procedure consists of five main steps. The note...
Technical Note
Full-year adjustment for modelling COVID-19 policies in SOUTHMOD tax-benefit microsimulation models
This technical note presents a modelling approach used in Lastunen et al. (2021) where tax and benefit policies are scaled to reflect their actual duration during a single calendar year. It can be applied to tax-benefit microsimulation models...
Working Paper
The effect of fiscal drag on income distribution and work incentives
Although the effect of fiscal drag is well studied in the industrialized world, empirical evidence from developing economies remains limited. Against this backdrop, this study aims to explore the effect of fiscal drag on income distribution and work...
Journal Article
The impact of indirect tax on income distribution and poverty in Tanzania
This study analyses the impacts of indirect tax benefits policy reforms on income distribution and poverty in Tanzania by applying a standard static microsimulation model TAZMOD v1.8. The simulations model two indirect tax reforms involving changes...
Blog
Ecuador’s social protection system failed during the pandemic: It needs a rethink
by
Xavier Jara, Lourdes Montesdeoca, Iva V. Tasseva
March 2021
Household incomes in Ecuador were badly hit by the pandemic, despite the government’s emergency grant to families. H Xavier Jara Tamayo (University of...
Working Paper
Simulating personal income tax in South Africa using administrative data and survey data
In this paper we explore South Africa’s personal income tax system using two microsimulation models. The first, SAMOD, simulates personal income tax and social benefits using a dataset derived from the nationally representative National Income...
Journal Article
Income distribution and the potential of redistributive systems in Africa
Redistributive systems in Africa are still in their infancy but are expanding in order to finance increasing public spending. This study aims at characterising the redistributive potential of six African countries: Ghana, Zambia, Mozambique, Tanzania...
Technical Note
Feasibility study: simulating the impacts of farm subsidies on poverty and inequality in African countries
Agricultural subsidies may have significant productive and distributional consequences, and policy-makers need to be able to assess these impacts as a part of the overall tax and benefit policy. Microsimulation models offer a tool for such analysis...
Journal Article
The role of automatic stabilizers and emergency tax–beneft policies during the COVID-19 pandemic
By combining household survey data before and during the COVID-19 pandemic with detailed tax-benefit simulations, this paper quantifies the distributional effects of COVID-19 in Ecuador and the role of tax-benefit policies in mitigating the immediate...
Technical Note
Integration of indirect taxation to GHAMOD
This note, with emphasis on VAT and excise taxes, illustrates how indirect taxes are modelled in the context of GHAMOD, a tax-benefit microsimulation model for Ghana. GHAMOD is similar to the EUROMOD base platform, and its built-in Statistics...
Report
SOUTHMOD country report Ecuador - ECUAMOD v2.0
View the latest ECUAMOD country report here. This report documents ECUAMOD, the SOUTHMOD micrososimulation model developed for Ecuador. It describes the different tax–benefit policies in place, how the microsimulation model takes advantage of these...