Current Project

Can rural property taxation generate revenue? Measuring costs and potential revenue in Sierra Leone

This project seeks to measure village-level costs and potential revenue associated with property taxation in rural Sierra Leone (Kono District). The only variable cost associated with rural tax collection in this context is tax collector transportation costs.
While travel costs can easily be obtained for any village, the most cost-effective way to measure potential revenue is for the tax collector to collect this data curing tax collection. To incentivize tax collectors to visit a set of randomly sampled villages, the Contractor will use on an existing Tax Collector Travel Subsidy program, which in 2019 achieved an 80% tax collector “visit” rate.

Researchers

Kevin Grieco

Kevin Grieco is a PhD Candidate in Political Science at the University of California, Los Angeles. He studies how low-capacity governments raise taxes and enforce policies. His current work focuses on fiscal capacity and traditional political institutions in Sierra Leone, collects original quantitative and qualitative data, uses field experiments to answer causal questions, and involves collaborations with local government and civil society partners.
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