Aligning public and private incentives for development: essays on tax and investment policy

Thesis

This thesis consists of three empirical essays on tax and investment policy, with a focus on low-income country development. Chapter 1 uses a difference-in-difference methodology to study the introduction of tax incentives aimed at promoting local raw material purchases in Uganda between 2018 and 2022. Chapter 2 (with Tanner Regan) studies the effect of public disclosure policies in Kampala, Uganda. We work with the city government to implement two large-scale cross-randomized multi-arm experiments to examine the ‘direct’ effect of warning property tax payers that their payment behaviour will be publicly disclosed, and the subsequent ‘indirect’ effect on recipients of this information. Compliance increases 17% for those threatened with public reporting but falls 16% for those promised recognition, a finding consistent with limited shame in delinquency but strong preferences for privacy in property ownership in this context. Disseminating tax behavior causes recipients to update compliance beliefs downward and reduces actual compliance by 20%. Chapter 3 (with Alonso Alfaro-Ureña, Banu Demir, Cédric Duprez, Isabela Manelici and Jose P. Vasquez) uses detailed administrative data from four countries at different levels of development to explore the behaviour of MNEs in receiving economies.

Authors: Manwaring, P

• DOI: 10.5287/ora-b7zg7xgjj
• Type of award: DPhil
• Level of award: Doctoral
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English
• Keywords: property tax; tax compliance; foreign investment; FDI linkages; public disclosure; industrial policy; supply chains; economic development; Uganda; tax incentives
• Subjects: Development economics; Public policy