UNU-WIDER’s Creating the fiscal space for development research area focuses on improving data and the analytical skills of researchers and policymakers around tax and benefit systems and reforming global monetary and financial systems to allow Global South countries to gain the fiscal space they need to invest in the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals.
Under this research area, we conduct research on tax policy, social protection, the political economy of taxation, and the international financial architecture. This research area has a strong capacity building component aimed at providing revenue authorities in sub-Saharan Africa with the tools and skills needed to strengthen their tax and benefit systems. By achieving the fiscal space necessary for development spending, this area of research supports greater fairness in the international financial architecture and the reduction of inequalities.
In the 2024-27 work programme, our work on creating the fiscal space for development includes the following projects:
Climate change is disproportionally affecting Global South countries and governments have fewer resources to mitigate the impact of the changing climate or rebuild after extreme weather events. As this research area seeks to strengthen the capacity of global south countries to mobilize public resources, it will be essential to understand how climate change affected their capabilities and what does climate change mean for their fiscal space.
Policies affect men and women differently and tax policies are no different. The projects under this research area will consider gender in the data collection and analysis to ensure policy interventions contribute to the achievement of gender equality or do not inadvertently disadvantage women or men.
UNU-WIDER has invested significantly in increasing the availability of administrative tax data to researchers and policymakers. This research area will continue working with revenue authorities in sub-Saharan Africa to build data infrastructure and capacity in the region. We will also pursue access to additional administrative data sources, such as enterprise registers, social protection databases and procurement data.
The research area Creating the fiscal space for development is rooted in the achievement of SDG 17 – Partnerships for the goal. The projects under this area will directly contribute to meeting target 17.1 – strengthening domestic resource mobilization – and target 17.4 – assisting Global South countries in attaining long-term debt sustainability.
The political economy of taxation
Reforming the international financial architecture
Lead | Kunal Sen
Core researchers | Amina Ebrahim, Pia Rattenhuber
Coordination | Irais Martinez Esparza, Riikka Aartola, Aino Hiltunen
Communications | Marie-France Boucher, Tristan Reid
This paper uses survey and tax administrative data to analyse the effects of a sizeable employer-borne payroll tax credit for young, low-wage workers in South Africa. We find fairly limited impacts of the wage subsidy on the employment of young, low...
At the last meeting of the Community of Practice on Gender and Tax (CoPGT), held on 10th September 2024, the conversation focused on microsimulation...
The collection of value added tax (VAT) is essential for achieving domestic revenue objectives, yet VAT gap estimation is rarely performed in developing countries. This study utilizes innovative tax declaration and audit data to estimate VAT...
The 4th International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD4) in Seville, Spain, will convene in 2025, providing a global stage for countries...
The forthcoming UN Conference on Financing for Development, set for mid-2025, continues a great sequence started in Monterrey in 2002, followed up in...
Nowadays, all policy makers must engage with direct and indirect carbon pricing issues. However, the implications of different types of tools and methods to price carbon and support decarbonization deserve further attention in view of their...
Low-income countries face the combined challenges of climate shocks and limited domestic revenue mobilization, yet these issues are rarely studied together. This paper provides new evidence on the impact of climate shocks on firm performance and tax...
Aggressive profit shifting by multinational enterprises (MNEs) is a growing concern for domestic resource mobilization in developing economies. This paper evaluates the revenue and welfare consequences of a flagship tax avoidance rule that has been...
Esta nota técnica diz respeito ao conjunto de ferramentas sobre as disparidades fiscais, que inclui código (o do-file do Stata) e um arquivo README (como executar o código). A nota técnica descreve a literatura e a metodologia subjacentes ao...
La presente nota se refiere al toolkit para la estimación de brechas tributarias, que incluye el código (archivos DO de Stata) y el archivo README (instrucciones para ejecutar el código). Esta nota describe la bibliografía y la metodología que...
Cette note technique concerne le guide pratique sur les écarts fiscaux, qui comprend un code (fichier Stata) et un fichier README (comment exécuter le code). La note décrit la littérature et la méthodologie derrière le développement du guide. Ce...
This technical note relates to the tax gap toolkit, which includes code (Stata do files) and a README file (how to run the code). The note describes the literature and methodology behind the development of the toolkit. The tax gap toolkit is related...
Theme: 2024-27, Fiscal space
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