Countries benefiting from large increases in the price of
hydrocarbons, metals and agricultural exports recorded important
growth in public revenue, as they taxed part of the land and mining
rent by imposing special taxes on the operating revenues of
mining companies. In turn, Argentina appropriated part of the
benefits accrued from the real exchange rate depreciation of 2002
by means of a selective ad valorem export tax, the incidence of
which is progressive^50. While the improvements in terms of trade
contributed to the increase in total revenue/GDP ratio, such
increase preceded the commodity boom and also resulted from
efforts at broadening the direct and indirect tax base and at
reducing evasion. In addition, several countries introduced a
“surrogate” tax on financial transactions which, while potentially
distortive (Cetrangolo and Sabaini 2006), is a ‘second best’ tax on
h i g h l y concentrated financial assets which would otherwise
remain untaxed.
It is still an open question whether the recent revenue increase
was enough to achieve the equity objectives of LOC governments,
or whether it exacerbated the regressive features of tax systems in
formalization of the economy. Such parameters are higher (0.75 and 0.54
respectively) for the boom years 2003-07. The test shows, in addition, that while
an increase in GDP/c lead to higher tax/GDP in LOC countries, no effects were
observed in NO-LOC countries. Overall, the hypothesis that LOC countries have
a more active tax policy seems broadly verified.
(^50) Governments developed a variety of fiscal mechanisms for appropriating
pa rt of the increase in commodity prices (CEPAL 2 007 , p.31). Argentina
introduced an export tax on selected agricultural goods. In turn, Venezuela,
Bolivia and Chile introduced new taxes to raise the revenue generated from
their non- renewable resources. As a result, the share of fiscal resources
represented by such revenue in Bolivia, Chile, Colombia and Mexico rose
from of 27.8%, 7.6%, 9.9% and 29.4% in the 1990s to 34.8%, 20%, 14.2%
and 37.5% in 2006-2007.