Subnational and Property Tax

While policymakers and academics have increasingly focused on national-level taxation in lower-income countries, subnational taxation has remained relatively neglected. Yet subnational taxes have wide-ranging and direct impacts on citizens in low-income countries with important implications for small business growth, local service delivery, equity, transparency, and accountability.

Property taxes are of particular interest: they hold significant revenue potential, are non-distortionary and progressive and are easily linked to public services – yet they remain chronically underexploited in almost all lower-income countries. Our research aims to expand the empirical evidence base on property and subnational taxation, centred on three key questions: (1) why existing systems underperform; (2) what reform strategies could overcome barriers to reform, including where reform has succeeded; (3) how reform dynamics vary across contexts, to offer a contextually grounded understanding of reform challenges.

This work is led by the Local Government Revenue Initiative (LoGRI), based at the University of Toronto.