Public revenue mobilisation for inclusive development

How can tax policies be used to increase economic growth and spur job creation? Working closely with the South African Revenue Service (SARS), researchers and policy practitioners explore the links between tax policy and economic growth. The work stream covers topics such as tax policy design and tax administration design, how COVID-19 impacted revenue collection, and how procurement procedures impact prices, quality, and corruption in public expenditure across the region.

In addition to the studies commissioned for this work stream, a primary goal will be to build the capacity to manage and use the tax administrative data which sits at the National Treasury and SARS. This work stream also invests in the future researchers and policymakers of the Southern African region by co-organizing a training in South Africa with UNU-WIDER’s Domestic Revenue Mobilization (DRM) programme. The UNU-WIDER Winter School on tax policy research provides early-career researchers in developing countries with a toolkit in applied public economics, with a special focus on the quantitative analysis of tax and public economics in developing countries.

Vacancies
by SA-TIED
Closing date: 14 November 2022 at 23:59 (GMT +2) Station: National Treasury, Pretoria, South Africa UNU-WIDER is looking for an outstanding individual with strong data skills, commitment and potential to contribute to the SA-TIED programme...
October 2022
Enterprise development
Public revenue
Labour market and inequality
Report
SA-TIED
This report is a summary of the SA-TIED programme’s major research contributions to the policy environment. These contributions are not policy proposals, but are meant to inform the policymaking process and fill important gaps in...
January 2022
Enterprise development
Public revenue
Macro-fiscal analysis
Labour market and inequality
Climate and energy
Phase 1 regional growth
Working paper
Maya Goldman, Ihsaan Bassier, Joshua Budlender, Lindi Mzankomo, Ingrid Woolard, and Murray Leibbrandt
We use a fiscal incidence model based on the South African 2014/15 Living Conditions Survey to simulate the poverty reduction impacts of a selection of medium-to-long-term social grant options with the goal of replacing the...
November 2021
Public revenue
Labour market and inequality
Working paper
Danie Schutte, Pieter van der Zwan, and Caro Janse van Rensburg
This paper analyses the permanent and temporary differences of South African firms for the period covered in the SARS-NT panel. The analysis provides valuable information about the differences between accounting profits and the taxable income...
September 2021
Public revenue
Working paper
Wynnona Steyn, Alexius Sithole, Winile Ngobeni, Eva Muwanga-Zake, Helen Barnes, Michael Noble, David McLennan,Gemma Wright, and Katrin Gasior
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...
July 2021
Public revenue
Working paper
Estian Calitz, Eva Muwanga-Zake, Alexius Sithole, and Wynnona Steyn
Nowadays, tax depreciation allowances are used less as instruments of macroeconomic stabilization and more as long-term measures to stimulate investment. This paper tabulates the types of accelerated depreciation allowances in South Africa and calculates the...
April 2020
Public revenue
Working paper
Ada Jansen, Winile Ngobeni, Alexius Sithole, and Wynnon Steyn
A key objective of many governments is to improve tax revenue mobilization. One way to achieve this is by improving tax compliance. This requires accurate knowledge of the tax gap, i.e. the difference between what...
April 2020
Public revenue
Working paper
Isaac Marcelin, Daniel Brink, David Oluwatosin Fadiran, and Hammed Adedeji Amusa
Employing the difference-in-differences technique, this study examines the impact of the Employment Tax Incentive programme on a large sample of South African firms from 2011 to 2016. It finds that programme firms expanded investments by...
July 2019
Public revenue
Working paper
by Amina Ebrahim and Jukka Pirttilä
The paper examines the incidence and employment impacts of the Employment Tax Incentive, a South African wage subsidy system that is targeted at the employers of low-wage youth. The paper uses a triple differences strategy...
March, 2019
Public revenue