IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ags/peppwp/164409.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Tax reforms in Sri Lanka: will a tax on public servant improve progessivity?

Author

Listed:
  • Arunatilake, Nisha
  • Jayawardena, Priyanka
  • Wijesinha, Anushka

Abstract

The Sri Lankan government implemented tax reforms in 2011, including removal of the tax exemption given to public servants and reduction of personal income tax rates in order to improve tax compliance from pay-as-you-earn (PAYE) tax payers. This study evaluates the 2007 and 2011 tax systems in order to examine the effects that taxing the income of public sector employees has on total tax revenues and the tax base. The study also compares the distributional effects of the different tax systems. Study further conducts simulation analyses to assess the most progressive means of achieving the 2007 tax revenue levels. Implications for tax evasion are also examined under different tax systems. The study finds that the 2011 tax reforms reduce tax revenue by 48 percent relative to the structure of income taxation in 2007. This decline in tax revenues occurs even though income taxes are extended to public sector workers because the 2011 tax reforms reduced the rate of income taxes across the board and increased the tax-free threshold. Our simulations show that tax revenues would have risen if the reforms were limited to introducing income taxes to public servants. The resulting (hypothetical) tax system would also have been more progressive than the tax structure resulting from the 2011 reforms. The study evaluated the distributional impacts of modifications to the 2011 tax system which would increase tax revenue to their level in 2007. More specifically, the present study finds that the most progressive way to attain this tax revenue target would be to increase tax rates on taxable income by 6 percentage points and to lower the tax-free threshold from LKR 600,000 to LKR 400,000.

Suggested Citation

  • Arunatilake, Nisha & Jayawardena, Priyanka & Wijesinha, Anushka, 2012. "Tax reforms in Sri Lanka: will a tax on public servant improve progessivity?," PEP Working Papers 164409, Partnership for Economic Policy (PEP).
  • Handle: RePEc:ags:peppwp:164409
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.164409
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/164409/files/1354542743-WP_2012-13_PMMA-12029.public.pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.164409?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Feldstein, Martin, 2008. "Effects of Taxes on Economic Behavior," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 61(1), pages 131-139, March.
    2. Mr. Robert Gillingham & David Locke Newhouse & Mr. David Coady & Mr. Kangni R Kpodar & Moataz El-Said & Mr. Paulo A Medas, 2006. "The Magnitude and Distribution of Fuel Subsidies: Evidence from Bolivia, Ghana, Jordan, Mali, and Sri Lanka," IMF Working Papers 2006/247, International Monetary Fund.
    3. Jean-Yves Duclos & Abdelkrim Araar, 2006. "Poverty and Equity," Economic Studies in Inequality, Social Exclusion, and Well-Being, Springer, number 978-0-387-33318-2, January.
    4. Essama-Nssah, B., 2008. "Assessing the redistributive effect of fiscal policy," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4592, The World Bank.
    5. Younger, Stephen D, et al, 1999. "Tax Incidence in Madagascar: An Analysis Using Household Data," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 13(2), pages 303-331, May.
    6. Deaton, A. & Zaidi, S., 1999. "Guidelines for Constructing Consumption Aggregates for Welfare Analysis," Papers 192, Princeton, Woodrow Wilson School - Development Studies.
    7. repec:bla:devpol:v:23:y:2005:i:2:p:131-144 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Angus Deaton & Salman Zaidi, 2002. "Guidelines for Constructing Consumption Aggregates for Welfare Analysis," World Bank Publications, The World Bank, number 14101, April.
    9. Margaret Grosh & Paul Glewwe, 2000. "Designing Household Survey Questionnaires for Developing Countries," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 25338.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. John A. Maluccio, 2009. "Household targeting in practice: The Nicaraguan Red de Protección Social," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 21(1), pages 1-23.
    2. Saadia Refaqat, 2005. "Redistributive Impact of GST Tax Reform: Pakistan, 1990-2001," The Pakistan Development Review, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, vol. 44(4), pages 841-862.
    3. Beegle, Kathleen & De Weerdt, Joachim & Friedman, Jed & Gibson, John, 2012. "Methods of household consumption measurement through surveys: Experimental results from Tanzania," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(1), pages 3-18.
    4. De Weerdt, Joachim & Beegle, Kathleen & Friedman, Jed & Gibson, John, 2014. "The challenge of measuring hunger," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6736, The World Bank.
    5. Deon Filmer & Kinnon Scott, 2012. "Assessing Asset Indices," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 49(1), pages 359-392, February.
    6. Kenneth R. Simler & Channing Arndt, 2007. "Poverty Comparisons With Absolute Poverty Lines Estimated From Survey Data," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 53(2), pages 275-294, June.
    7. Çakır, Mustafa Yavuz & Kabundi, Alain, 2013. "Trade shocks from BRIC to South Africa: A global VAR analysis," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 190-202.
    8. Akanksha Srivastava & Sanjay Mohanty, 2012. "Poverty Among Elderly in India," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 109(3), pages 493-514, December.
    9. Hidrobo, Melissa & Hoddinott, John & Peterman, Amber & Margolies, Amy & Moreira, Vanessa, 2014. "Cash, food, or vouchers? Evidence from a randomized experiment in northern Ecuador," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 144-156.
    10. Nguyen, Minh Cong & Winters, Paul, 2011. "The impact of migration on food consumption patterns: The case of Vietnam," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 71-87, February.
    11. Peter Davis & Bob Baulch, 2010. "Casting the net wide and deep: lessons learned in a mixed-methods study of poverty dynamics in rural Bangladesh," Working Papers id:2674, eSocialSciences.
    12. Beaman, Lori & Dillon, Andrew, 2012. "Do household definitions matter in survey design? Results from a randomized survey experiment in Mali," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(1), pages 124-135.
    13. Klasen, Stephan & Reimers, Malte, 2017. "Looking at Pro-Poor Growth from an Agricultural Perspective," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 147-168.
    14. Clementi, Fabio & Molini, Vasco & Schettino, Francesco, 2018. "All that Glitters is not Gold: Polarization Amid Poverty Reduction in Ghana," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 275-291.
    15. Leonardo Gasparini, 2006. "Assessing benefit-incidence results using decompositions. The case of health policy in Argentina," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 4(40), pages 1-10.
    16. Anna D'Souza & Dean Jolliffe, 2012. "Rising Food Prices and Coping Strategies: Household-level Evidence from Afghanistan," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(2), pages 282-299, August.
    17. David E. Sahn & Stephen D. Younger, 2009. "Measuring intra‐household health inequality: explorations using the body mass index," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 18(S1), pages 13-36, April.
    18. Michael Lokshin & Nithin Umapathi & Stefano Paternostro, 2006. "Robustness of subjective welfare analysis in a poor developing country: Madagascar 2001," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(4), pages 559-591.
    19. Sami Bibi & Mustapha K. Nabli, 2009. "Income Inequality In The Arab Region: Data And Measurement, Patterns And Trends," Middle East Development Journal (MEDJ), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 1(02), pages 275-314.
    20. Stoddard, Pamela & Handley, Margaret A. & Vargas Bustamante, Arturo & Schillinger, Dean, 2011. "The influence of indigenous status and community indigenous composition on obesity and diabetes among Mexican adults," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 73(11), pages 1635-1643.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Public Economics;

    JEL classification:

    • H20 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - General
    • H21 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Efficiency; Optimal Taxation
    • H23 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Externalities; Redistributive Effects; Environmental Taxes and Subsidies
    • H24 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Personal Income and Other Nonbusiness Taxes and Subsidies
    • H30 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:peppwp:164409. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cdvlvca.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.