Impact of export upgrading on tax revenue in developing and high-income countries

International audienceEmpirical studies usually analyse the relationship between an economy’strade sector and tax revenue in developing countries through the e"ectof trade liberalization on tax revenue. This paper takes a di"erent angle byexamining the impact of export upgrading strategies (export diversi#cationand improvement in export quality) on non-resource tax revenue. The paneldata-set covers a sample of 172 countries, including both developed anddeveloping countries, spanning the period 1980–2010. The analysis isconducted both on the entire sample and sub-samples. The #ndings indicatethat export product upgrading exerts a positive and signi#cant e"ect onnon-resource tax revenue, including for the sub-samples considered, withthe exception of low-income countries for which we observe mixed results.Moreover, countries which upgrade their export products in a context oftrade openness consistently experience higher non-resource tax revenue,both in the short and long term