Tax Revenue in Sub-Saharan Africa: Effects of Economic Policies and Corruption

Dhaneshwar Ghura

No 1998/135, IMF Working Papers from International Monetary Fund

Abstract: An analysis of data for 39 sub-Saharan African countries during 1985–96 indicates that the variations in tax revenue-GDP ratios within this group are influenced by economic policies and the level of corruption. Namely, these ratios rise with declining inflation, implementation of structural reforms, rising human capital (a proxy for the provision of public services by the government), and declining corruption. The paper confirms that the tax revenue ratio rises with income, and that elements of a country’s tax base (such as the share of agriculture in GDP and the degree of openness) influence tax revenue.

Keywords: WP; economic policy; revenue-GDP ratio; tax ratio; beta coefficient; terms of trade; debt stock-GDP ratio; utility function; revenue improvement; rate of inflation; grants-GDP ratio; tax revenue-GDP ratio; tax mobilization; Corruption; Real effective exchange rates; Structural reforms; Human capital; Sub-Saharan Africa (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 25
Date: 1998-09-01
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (177)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=2754 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:imf:imfwpa:1998/135

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/pubs/ord_info.htm

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IMF Working Papers from International Monetary Fund International Monetary Fund, Washington, DC USA. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Akshay Modi ().