Changing Tax Elasticities Over Time: The Case of Tanzania

Abstract: In most studies, tax elasticity, which measures responsiveness of tax revenue to income growth, is assumed constant over time by the use of a double-log tax function. In practice, tax elasticities may change over time with changing tax structures and economic conditions. Neglecting tax elasticity changes can lead to inappropriate tax forecasts or policy recommendations. In this study, use of a flexible form tax function admits the possibility of fluctuating intertemporal tax elasticities. The model is applied to tax revenue data for Tanzania, a developing country in southeastern Africa, and intertemporal tax elasticities are estimated for the overall tax system and for major Tanzanian taxes. The unrestricted flexible form model is compared with alternative restricted models, and chi-squared tests are used to reject the restrictions in all cases. The general finding of the study is that tax elasticities in Tanzania have been varying over time, a warning to researchers who have been relying on constant elasticity models for estimating tax elasticities. Résumé: Dans la plupart des études, on prend pour hypothése qu'en utilisant une fonction double logarithmique pour les impôts, l'élasticité de l'im pôt qui mesure l'ajustement des recettes fiscales par rapport à la croissance des revenus, demeure constante. Dans la pratique, il se peut que I'élasticité de l'impôt évolue dans le temps avec les variations des structures de la fiscalité et des conditions économiques. Si on néglige l'éolution de l'élasticité de l'impôt, cette omission peut se traduire par des prévisions fiscales ou des recommandations de politique générale inadapées à la situation. Dans cette étude, le recours à une fonction flexible d'estimation de la fiscalité revient à admettre la possibilité de fluctuations, dans le temps, de l'élasticité de l'impôt. Ce modéle (fonction double logarithmique) est appliqué aux données concernant les recettes fiscales de la Tanzanie, un pays en développement du sud-est de l'Afrique, pour lequel des estimations des fluctuations dans le temps, de l'élasticité de l'impôt font l'objet d'estimations pour l'ensemble du systéme fiscal ainsi que pour les principaux impôts. Le modèle flexible sans contrainte est comparé au modèle avec contrainte. On a eu recours aux tests du khi-deux pour rejeter les hypothèses de contraintes dans tous les cas. Dans cette étude on en est arrivéà la conclusion que les élasticités de l'impôt en Tanzanie ont varié avec le temps. Cette conclusion est un avertissement aux chercheurs qui tablent sur des modèles d'élasticité constante pour faire des estimations de l'élasticité de l'impôt.     

Trans-organizational innovation: a framework for research

Information and communication technologies, the evolution of a pattern of innovation based on technology fusion and the transition towards a knowledge-based economy are dominant trends. These trends support trans-organitational innovation, which typically involves the design of complex and technologically hybrid products. Trans-organizational innovation involves generating new knowledge out of knowledge inputs which are distributed across disciplines and organizations which may be geographically dispersed. This is critically dependent on management processes associated with learning. Learning is a contextually situated and interaction-intensive process, which during product innovation involves mutual interaction between characteristics of product and those of context. Such interactions continually evolve the designed form and functionalig of a product. Existing research has tended to neglect the complexities involved in trans-organitational innovation. A product-in-context framework for analyzing the trans-organitational innovation process is detailed in this paper. This framework can be used to examine the relationship between critical features at Product and context which mediate learning during trans-organizational product design and innovation and account for product design variation.     

Health, Health Care and Social Welfare

This paper reviews the conceptualisation of social welfare in the health economics literature, and the contribution of health and health care to social welfare.     

GOVERNMENT VERSUS PRIVATE QUALITY ASSURANCE FOR AUSTRALIAN FOOD EXPORTS

Most foodstuffs have quality attributes that are difficult to determine prior to purchase. Thus quality assurance is an inherent problem in food exporting. Private quality assurance can succeed if exporters can credibly signal that they have much to lose from cessation of purchases. If exporters do not provide credible quality signals, and foreign importers judge food quality according to country of origin, honest exporters can suffer negative spillovers from others' cheating under either government or private quality assurance. For both economic and political reasons, the best choice between government and private quality assurance will differ between foods and importing countries.     

Value for Money? Neo‐Liberalism in New South Wales Prisons

The NSW prison sector has undergone considerable reform over the last ten years. The NSW government now oversees the operation of publicly managed prisons, one privately managed prison and a number of new public prisons operating under the new 'Way Forward' management model. In order to establish which approach to prison management offered the best value for money, the NSW government undertook a 'value for money' assessment in 2005. In this article, we argue the cost accounting information is privileged in the assessment process. However, we contend that this information was limited and partial, and provided a poor basis on which to form policy. Even so, the NSW government has proceeded on this basis. In order to explain this, we position the report within the wider neo-liberal turn in policymaking and the workplace reforms that have accompanied it.     

THE PROCESSING OF CRISIS AND NON-CRISIS STRATEGIC ISSUES

This paper asserts that organizations process different types of strategic issues in systematically different ways, proposing that organizational decision-makers expend greater resources, centralize authority and generate a greater volume of causal explanations during the processing of crisis versus non-crisis strategic issues. Data from comparative tracings of several crisis and non-crisis issues in a single organization lend preliminary support to the propositions. By conceptualizing the process of issue resolution both from an instrumental and symbolic perspective, this type of response to crisis issues can be interpreted. The theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.     

The Balanced Scorecard: Slogans, Seduction, and State of Play

This paper outlines claims and evidence concerning the balanced scorecard (BSC) from the research literature, integrating current thinking about its substantive content and assumptions, strategic alignment, implementation issues, judgment and decision-making, organisational performance, compensation plans, and comparisons to other performance-measurement practices. In doing so, diverse localisations of the BSC are brought into view, as well as difficulties accompanying the practice of the BSC. Future directions for practitioners and researchers are indicated.     

Financial Innovation and Divisia Money in Taiwan: Comparative Evidence from Neural Network and Vector Error-Correction Forecasting Models

In this article a Divisia monetary index is constructed for the Taiwan economy, and its inflation forecasting potential is compared with that of its traditional simple sum counterpart. The Divisia index is adjusted in two ways to allow for the financial liberalization that Taiwan has experienced since the 1970s. The powerful artificial intelligence technique of neural networks is used and is found to beat the conventional econometric techniques in a simple inflation forecasting experiment. The preferred inflation forecasting model is achieved using networks that employ a Divisia M2 measure of money that has been adjusted to incorporate a learning mechanism to allow individuals to gradually alter their perceptions of the increased productivity of money. The explanatory power of the two innovation-adjusted Divisia aggregates dominates that of the simple sum counterpart in the majority of cases. (JEL C4 , E4 , E5 )     

Influences on technology strategy in the uk oil- and gas-related industry network

In the course of the last 25 years the UK has seen the emergence of a new, technologically advanced network of organisations underpinning the technical needs of the oil and gas extraction industry.The euolution of this industy network has taken place within a public policy framework which has had too central objectives: to maximize UK industrial involvement in the industry and to maximize. North Sea oil and gas extraction. The extent to which this framework has encouraged the development of new, technology-based firms has not been systematical stuided. This study examines the extent of indigenous incoltlement in the network and the influence of the currrent pressures of economic and policy changes on the performance and strategic planning of these compnies.