This page contains information on the SOUTHMOD project Phase 1. For the Phase 2 project information (2020-23) see here. For the Phase 3 project information (2024-2027) see here.
Tax-benefit microsimulation models, which combine representative household-level data on incomes and expenditures and detailed coding of tax and benefit legislation, have proven to be an extremely useful tool for researchers and policy makers alike. The models apply user-defined tax and benefit policy rules to micro-data on individuals and households and calculate the effects of these rules on household income.The effects of different policy scenarios on poverty, inequality, and government revenues can be analysed and compared.
While microsimulation models are routinely used by researchers and policy makers in developed countries, few developing countries have access to such tools. Many of the developing countries are now building up their social protection systems and the financing of public spending will need to be increasingly based on domestic tax revenues. In this process, understanding the system-wide impacts of different policy choices is critically important, and tax-benefit microsimulation models are very well suited for this purpose.
The following SOUTHMOD models and the associated input data are freely available for non-commercial research use: ECUAMOD (Ecuador), GHAMOD (Ghana), MicroZAMOD (Zambia), MOZMOD (Mozambique) and UGAMOD (Uganda). For the following countries, we can provide the models and the Stata do-files necessary to produce the underpinning input data set that corresponds to each model: Tanzania (TAZMOD), Vietnam (VNMOD), and Ethiopia (ETMOD). You can apply for access here. Models for Namibia (NAMOD) and South Africa (SAMOD) are available from SASPRI.
This is the backdrop against which UNU-WIDER, the EUROMOD team at the Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER) at the University of Essex, and Southern African Social Policy Research Institute (SASPRI) have launched a major research project in which tax-benefit microsimulation models for selected developing countries in Africa (Ethiopia, Ghana, Mozambique, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia) and also elsewhere (Ecuador and Vietnam) have been built in addition to those that already exist for South Africa and Namibia. They can be used for analysing the impacts of different tax and benefit policy scenarios. The project is supported by UNU-WIDER, and based on joint research work with the three participating institutes and researchers from the countries for which the models will be built.
The models are based on the EUROMOD platform. EUROMOD is both a widely-used tax-benefit model for European countries, but has also been found to be an ideal platform with which to develop microsimulation models for other countries. Indeed, researchers at SASPRI in collaboration with the EUROMOD team have successfully built models using the EUROMOD platform for South Africa and Namibia.
Social protection has attracted increasing interest in developing countries in recent decades and policies have been initiated in all developing regions. When countries build up their social protection systems, they need reliable information and...
View the latest UGAMOD country report here. This report documents UGAMOD, the SOUTHMOD model developed for Uganda. This work was carried out by Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) and Makerere University in collaboration with the project partners. The...
View the latest MOZMOD country report here. This report documents MOZMOD, the SOUTHMOD model developed for Mozambique. This work was carried out by the Ministry of Economy and Finance of Mozambique in collaboration with the project partners in the...
View the latest TAZMOD country report here. This report documents TAZMOD, the SOUTHMOD model developed for Tanzania. This work was carried out by University of Dar es Salaam in collaboration with the project partners in the scope of the SOUTHMOD...
View the latest ECUAMOD country report here. This report documents ECUAMOD, the SOUTHMOD micrososimulation model developed for Ecuador. This work was carried out by the ISER in collaboration with the Instituto de Altos Estudios Nacionales and UNU...
View the latest MicroZAMOD country report here. This report documents MicroZAMOD, the SOUTHMOD model developed for Zambia. This work was carried out by Zambia Institute for Policy Analysis & Research (ZIPAR) in collaboration with the project partners...
View the latest GHAMOD country report here. This report documents GHAMOD, the SOUTHMOD model developed for Ghana. This work was carried out by the Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER) and the University of Tampere in...
Part of Journal Special Issue SOUTHMOD: Modelling Tax-benefit Systems in Developing Countries
Social protection has attracted increasing interest in developing countries in recent decades and policies have been initiated in all developing regions. Cash transfer policies are already in place in many African countries, but their coverage is...
Part of Journal Special Issue SOUTHMOD: Modelling Tax-benefit Systems in Developing Countries
Part of Journal Special Issue SOUTHMOD: Modelling Tax-benefit Systems in Developing Countries
Part of Journal Special Issue SOUTHMOD: Modelling Tax-benefit Systems in Developing Countries
Part of Journal Special Issue SOUTHMOD: Modelling Tax-benefit Systems in Developing Countries
The ability to raise revenues from taxes – called “fiscal capacity” – is a crucial aspect for the functioning of any state. Being able to tax citizens...
This paper assesses the effects on poverty and inequality of the alternative targeting approaches that Zambia’s Social Cash Transfer programme could take as its expansion continues during the period of the country’s Seventh National Development Plan...
This paper analyses the impacts of indirect tax 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 to the...
The aim of this paper is to quantify the financial cost that informal workers would incur in the event of entering formality, accounting for potential earnings gains upon entry. To do so, we use representative microdata from Ecuador and Colombia...
Redistributive systems in Africa are still in their infancy but are constantly expanding in order to finance increasing public spending. This paper aims at characterizing the redistributive potential of six African countries: Ghana, Zambia...
We analyse the effect of taxes and benefits on income distribution of six Latin American countries: Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Uruguay, and Venezuela. Our analysis makes use of tax-benefit microsimulation models based on harmonized...
In this paper we explore the income data in two surveys that underpin a South African tax-benefit microsimulation model. The simulated taxes and benefits using each dataset are compared with each other and with administrative data for a common time...
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...
Top income under-coverage in developing countries not only leads to downward biased inequality indicators but might also affect the ex-ante evaluation of progressive tax reforms. We propose a simple adjustment to top incomes for formal employees (e.g...
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...
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...
The level of income can be directly inferred from the level of education, making education an important variable as a key determinant of better livelihoods and poverty alleviation. However, in most developing countries education is not accessible to...
The tax-benefit microsimulation model developed for Mozambique, MOZMOD, has proved to be valuable in analysing the impacts and budget implications of...
This project is part of The economics and politics of taxation and social protection
Theme: 2014-18, Inclusion
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