IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wbk/wbrwps/73.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Taxation and output growth in Africa

Author

Listed:
  • Skinner, Jonathon

Abstract

This paper presents a framework for measuring how the structure of taxation and government spending affect output growth. It is shown that when countries are not following a steady-state growth path, static and dynamic distortions will affect output growth. In particular, taxes can affect output by; (1) reducing the marginal productivity of capital and labour, and (2) reducing the supply of capital and labour. The paper indicates that differences in tax policy can explain a substantial degree of variation in output growth among African countries. While measurement error and the potential for excluded variables suggest that the regression results be interpreted cautiously, the results imply that the structure, and not simply the level, of taxation can play an importantrole for encouraging growth in developing countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Skinner, Jonathon, 1988. "Taxation and output growth in Africa," Policy Research Working Paper Series 73, The World Bank.
    • Handle: RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:73
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/1988/08/01/000009265_3960927031000/Rendered/PDF/multi_page.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Auerbach, Alan J & Kotlikoff, Laurence J & Skinner, Jonathan, 1983. "The Efficiency Gains from Dynamic Tax Reform," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 24(1), pages 81-100, February.
    2. Stewart, Douglas B & Venieris, Yiannis P, 1985. "Sociopolitical Instability and the Behavior of Savings in Less-Developed Countries," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 67(4), pages 557-563, November.
    3. Seidman, Laurence S, 1984. "Conversion to a Consumption Tax: The Transition in a Life-Cycle Growth Model," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 92(2), pages 247-267, April.
    4. David, Paul A., 1977. "Invention and accumulation in america's economic growth: A nineteenth-century parable," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 6(1), pages 179-228, January.
    5. Koester, Reinhard B & Kormendi, Roger C, 1989. "Taxation, Aggregate Activity and Economic Growth: Cross-Country Evidence on Some Supply-Side Hypotheses," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 27(3), pages 367-386, July.
    6. Jaime A. P. de Melo, 1978. "Estimating the Costs of Protection: A General Equilibrium Approach," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 92(2), pages 209-226.
    7. Feder, Gershon, 1983. "On exports and economic growth," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1-2), pages 59-73.
    8. Schneider, Friedrich & Frey, Bruno S., 1985. "Economic and political determinants of foreign direct investment," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 161-175, February.
    9. Sherman Robinson, 1971. "Sources of Growth in Less Developed Countries: A Cross-Section Study," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 85(3), pages 391-408.
    10. Kormendi, Roger C. & Meguire, Philip G., 1985. "Macroeconomic determinants of growth: Cross-country evidence," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(2), pages 141-163, September.
    11. Brent, Robert J., 1986. "Lagged reactions in short-run estimates of tax shifting of company income and sales taxes in Kenya," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(1), pages 15-32.
    12. Landau, Daniel, 1986. "Government and Economic Growth in the Less Developed Countries: An Empirical Study for 1960-1980," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 35(1), pages 35-75, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Emmanuel Atta Anaman & Samuel Gameli Gadzo & John Gartchie Gatsi & Mavis Pobbi, 2017. "Fiscal Aggregates, Government Borrowing and Economic Growth in Ghana An error correction approach," Advances in Management and Applied Economics, SCIENPRESS Ltd, vol. 7(2), pages 1-5.
    2. Mr. Philip R. Gerson, 1998. "The Impact of Fiscal Policy Variables on Output Growth," IMF Working Papers 1998/001, International Monetary Fund.
    3. Cosimo Magazzino & Marco Mele, 2022. "A Dynamic Factor and Neural Networks Analysis of the Co-movement of Public Revenues in the EMU," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 8(2), pages 289-338, July.
    4. Engen, Eric M. & Skinner, Jonathan, 1996. "Taxation and Economic Growth," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 49(4), pages 617-642, December.
    5. Uche Boniface Ugwuanyi & Okelue David Ugwunta, 2017. "Fiscal Policy and Economic Growth: An Examination of Selected Countries in Sub-Saharan Africa," International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, Human Resource Management Academic Research Society, International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, vol. 7(1), pages 117-130, January.

    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. Jonathan S. Skinner, 1987. "Taxation and Output Growth: Evidence from African Countries," NBER Working Papers 2335, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. W. Robert & J. Alexander, 1997. "Inflation and economic growth: evidence from a growth equation," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(2), pages 233-238.
    3. Sefa Awaworyi Churchill & Mehmet Ugur & Siew Ling Yew, 2017. "Does Government Size Affect Per-Capita Income Growth? A Hierarchical Meta-Regression Analysis," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 93(300), pages 142-171, March.
    4. Renelt, David, 1991. "Economic growth : a review of the theoretical and empirical literature," Policy Research Working Paper Series 678, The World Bank.
    5. Celal Kucuker, 2003. "Türkiye Ýktisat Kongresi Büyüme Stratejileri Çalýþma Grubu," Working Papers 2003/5, Turkish Economic Association.
    6. Dimitrios Paparas & Christian Richter, 2015. "Fiscal policy and economic growth: Empirical evidence from the European Union," Working Papers 2015.06, International Network for Economic Research - INFER.
    7. Dimitrios PAPARAS & Christian RICHTER & Alexandros PAPARAS, 2015. "Fiscal Policy and Economic Growth, Empirical Evidence in European Union," Turkish Economic Review, KSP Journals, vol. 2(4), pages 239-268, December.
    8. Shuanglin Lin & Shunfeng Song, 2002. "Urban Economic Growth in China: Theory and Evidence," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 39(12), pages 2251-2266, November.
    9. Halkos, George & Paizanos, Epameinondas, 2015. "Fiscal policy and economic performance: A review of the theoretical and empirical literature," MPRA Paper 67737, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Abu-Bader, Suleiman & Abu-Qarn, Aamer S., 2003. "Government expenditures, military spending and economic growth: causality evidence from Egypt, Israel, and Syria," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 25(6-7), pages 567-583, September.
    11. Levine, Ross & Renelt, David, 1991. "Cross-country studies of growth and policy : methodological, conceptual, and statistical problems," Policy Research Working Paper Series 608, The World Bank.
    12. Peter Nijkamp & Jacques Poot, Victoria, 2002. "Meta-Analysis of the Impact of Fiscal Policies on Long-Run Growth," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 02-028/3, Tinbergen Institute, revised 23 Apr 2003.
    13. Hüseyin Şen & Ayşe Kaya & Ayşegül Durucan, 2023. "New insights into the growth-maximizing size of government: evidence and implications for Turkey," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 56(4), pages 2243-2296, August.
    14. Zaidi Sattar, 1993. "Government Control and Economic Growth in Asia: Evidence from Time Series Data," The Pakistan Development Review, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, vol. 32(2), pages 179-197.
    15. W. Robert & J. Alexander, 1994. "The investment-output ratio in growth regressions," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 1(5), pages 74-76.
    16. Nijkamp, Peter & Poot, Jacques, 2004. "Meta-analysis of the effect of fiscal policies on long-run growth," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 20(1), pages 91-124, March.
    17. António Afonso & João Tovar Jalles, 2012. "The Fiscal-Growth Nexus," Working Papers Department of Economics 2012/01, ISEG - Lisbon School of Economics and Management, Department of Economics, Universidade de Lisboa.
    18. Marin, Dalia, 1992. "Is the Export-Led.Growth Hypothesis Valid for Industrialized Countries?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 74(4), pages 678-688, November.
    19. Sayef Bakari, 2017. "The Impact of Vegetables Exports on Economic Growth in Tunisia," Economic Research Guardian, Mutascu Publishing, vol. 7(2), pages 72-87, December.
    20. Garrison, Charles B. & Lee, Feng-Yao, 1995. "The effect of macroeconomic variables on economic growth rates: A cross-country study," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 17(2), pages 303-317.

    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:wbk:wbrwps:73. 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: Roula I. Yazigi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dvewbus.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.