UNU-WIDER's tax administrative data work presented at the launch of the Finnish Centre of Excellence in Tax Systems Research

Tampere University, VATT Institute for Economic Research and University of Helsinki organize the launch of the Finnish Centre of Excellence in Tax Systems Research (FIT) at Tampere, Finland on 1-2 September 2022. The event is attended by several UNU-WIDER tax researchers.

On Friday 2 September the second lead of the Centre of Excellence and UNU-WIDER Non-Resident Senior Research Fellow Jukka Pirttilä is chairing the session I of the researcher workshop. Research Assistant Kwabena Adu-Ababio gives a presentation at the workshop session III on 'Assessing the impact of a withholding VAT intervention in Zambia'. Joel Slemrod and Mazhar Waseem from the UNU-WIDER research network present their work on determinants and consequences of spouses' name order on joint returns and on value-added tax, respectively. Joel Slemrod, a member of the advisory group of UNU-WIDER's DRM programme, is also the keynote speaker of the launch event on 1 September.

The aim of FIT is to analyze the effects of the tax-benefit system and regulation on individuals, firms, and the society, and to provide new credible evidence on the determinants of optimal policy. UNU-WIDER researchers will be working in close collaboration with the FIT. UNU-WIDER Non-Resident Senior Research Fellow Nadine Riedel is also a member of the scientific advisory board of FIT.

The presentations are part of UNU-WIDER's Building up efficient and fair tax systems – lessons based on administrative tax data project, which is one workstream under UNU-WIDER's programme on Domestic Revenue Mobilization (DRM). The DRM programme is financed by the Norwegian development co-operation agency Norad.