Despite significant progress in recent decades, labor markets across the world remain divided along gender lines. Female labor force participation has remained lower than male participation, gender wage gaps are high, and women are overrepresented in the informal sector and among the poor. In many countries, legal restrictions persist which constrain women from developing their full economic potential. While equality between men and women is in itself an important development goal, women's economic participation is also a part of the growth and stability equation. In rapidly aging economies, higher female labor force participation can boost growth by mitigating the impact of a shrinking workforce. Better opportunities for women can also contribute to broader economic development in developing economies, for instance through higher levels of school enrollment for girls.
After restoring stability, Argentina needs to turn hard-won gains into lasting prosperity
Sustained rebalancing requires policy action in both surplus and deficit countries
Stronger oversight, better data, and deeper coordination are needed to safeguard faster and more interconnected markets
With the rise of more expansive investment models, it is time to renew focus on sound legal frameworks
Less demand, more production, and inventory drawdowns prevented a larger price spike. A quick supply recovery is essential to avoid further damage to the global economy
Integrating and deepening banking and venture capital markets would boost output by at least 3 percent, and make business dynamism reforms more powerful
This HLS summarizes IMF technical assistance provided to Angola on strengthening the management of VAT credits and refunds. The mission assessed the significant accumulation of excess VAT credits—equivalent to 0.5 percent of GDP—and identified structural, legal, operational, and compliance-related factors behind this build-up. The mission recommends strengthening the integrity of VAT credits and refund processes through improved invoice controls, risk-based verification, enhanced Standard Audit File for Tax Purposes (SAF-T) and VAT filing compliance, alternative collection mechanisms for high-risk sectors, and development of modern risk analytics. It further recommends the establishment of an Extraordinary VAT Excess Credit Regularization Program to validate and clear long-outstanding credit balances, evaluation of cross-tax offsetting options, and implementation of measures to reinforce governance, transparency, and internal control across the VAT refund system.
Botswana’s VAT performance has been steady as a share of GDP, averaging about 3-4 percent of GDP annually. An IMF CD mission in 2025-26 applied the RA-GAP top-down VAT gap model to Botswana’s data for 2017-2024 to estimate both the VAT compliance gap and policy gap. Botswana’s overall VAT gap is significant and rising, reaching 5.8 percent of GDP in 2024 (up from 4.9 percent in 2017). The increase was driven by marked deterioration in the compliance gap after 2018, while the policy gap remained relatively stable. Much of the non-compliance is concentrated in a few sectors. These results imply considerable revenue at risk and underscore the need for strengthened revenue administration efforts. High-level recommendations include building analytic capacity, improving data quality, institutionalizing regular VAT gap estimation, and integrating gap results into compliance risk management.
This technical assistance (TA) mission was conducted to support the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) in developing a first-time Residential Property Price Index (RPPI) for Kenya. The mission focused on improving data collection, refining statistical compilation methods, and building capacity aligned with international best practices. The findings highlighted significant progress in stabilizing web scraping data collection and developing the procedures for index compilation, though challenges remain in data quality and model robustness, especially outside Nairobi. The report recommends launching the RPPI by March 2026 along with a press release and comprehensive dissemination materials. Thereafter, KNBS intend to publish the data on a quarterly basis. Publishing the RPPI will be a major achievement for KNBS, but ongoing development of data collection and statistical methods should continue in the coming years.
This capacity development (CD) project financed by the Data for Decisions (D4D) Fund, was developed in response to a request from the Macro-Economic Statistics Division of Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) to provide technical assistance (TA) on rebasing the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) for Uganda (results are soon to be published).
This document summarizes the completion and main outcomes of a Technical Assistance project aimed at strengthening the capacity of Mauritania’s National Committee on Public Debt (CNDP) in public debt projection and analysis. At the request of the Mauritanian authorities, the IMF’s Institute for Capacity Development (ICD) implemented a multi-mission program between January 2024 and January 2025, combining in-country missions with sustained remote engagement. The project focused on implementing and customizing the IMF’s Public Debt Dynamics Tool (DDT), including a resource-rich country version and a natural disaster module. Through hands-on training, the CNDP strengthened its ability to produce debt projections, conduct scenario analysis, and prepare a comprehensive public debt report.
Since 2022, UK gilt yields, especially at long maturities, have risen above G7 peers, increasing borrowing costs and tightening financial conditions. This paper examines the drivers of the UK term premium — the component of yields reflecting time-varying risk compensation beyond expected short rates. In the UK, shifts in the investor base and rising importance of domestic factors may also have contributed, alongside signs of increased market fragility after the September 2022 turmoil. Maintaining credible policy frameworks and adapting debt management strategies to evolving demand conditions are key to containing the term premium.
Governments have historically used financial repression to reduce debt and fiscal pressures, yet few systematic measures of repression exist. To fill this gap, we introduce two quantity-based repression indicators grounded in a structural portfolio-choice model, exploiting the gap in government-bond demand between captive and non-captive investors. A narrow fiscal indicator captures pressure on banks to hold government bonds. A consolidated measure adds the perimeter of central bank liabilities. Applying our measures to a novel dataset of 17 advanced economies since 1920, we find that financial repression has been a persistent feature of modern history, peaking after World War II, receding during the capital account liberalization era, and rising again after the Global Financial Crisis. Our measures correlate with conditions typically associated with repression—such as high debt burdens and restricted capital mobility—along with crowding out of private investment and credit. Using a debt decomposition framework, we show that repression was a major driver of debt reduction after World War II, generating larger fiscal savings than traditional seigniorage, and has again generated fiscal savings since the Global Financial Crisis. With the conditions historically associated with elevated repression present today, our evidence suggests that financial repression may see increased use going forward.
This document summarizes the completion and main outcomes of a Technical Assistance project aimed at strengthening the capacity of Mauritania’s National Committee on Public Debt (CNDP) in public debt projection and analysis. At the request of the Mauritanian authorities, the IMF’s Institute for Capacity Development (ICD) implemented a multi-mission program between January 2024 and January 2025, combining in-country missions with sustained remote engagement. The project focused on implementing and customizing the IMF’s Public Debt Dynamics Tool (DDT), including a resource-rich country version and a natural disaster module. Through hands-on training, the CNDP strengthened its ability to produce debt projections, conduct scenario analysis, and prepare a comprehensive public debt report.
This paper uses a microsimulation model to assess the revenue potential, labor-supply and distributional effects of alternative labor tax reforms. The scope for new measures to raise significant revenue in the future through a uniform increase in labor taxes, without significantly weakening labor supply, is limited. Targeted increases in marginal tax rates toward the bottom of the earnings distribution could raise more revenue, with lower efficiency losses, but come with an equity trade-off. More fundamental reforms that improve work incentives in line with optimal tax design could deliver higher revenues with a better efficiency-equity trade-off.
After restoring stability, Argentina needs to turn hard-won gains into lasting prosperity
Sustained rebalancing requires policy action in both surplus and deficit countries
Stronger oversight, better data, and deeper coordination are needed to safeguard faster and more interconnected markets
With the rise of more expansive investment models, it is time to renew focus on sound legal frameworks
Less demand, more production, and inventory drawdowns prevented a larger price spike. A quick supply recovery is essential to avoid further damage to the global economy
Integrating and deepening banking and venture capital markets would boost output by at least 3 percent, and make business dynamism reforms more powerful
This HLS summarizes IMF technical assistance provided to Angola on strengthening the management of VAT credits and refunds. The mission assessed the significant accumulation of excess VAT credits—equivalent to 0.5 percent of GDP—and identified structural, legal, operational, and compliance-related factors behind this build-up. The mission recommends strengthening the integrity of VAT credits and refund processes through improved invoice controls, risk-based verification, enhanced Standard Audit File for Tax Purposes (SAF-T) and VAT filing compliance, alternative collection mechanisms for high-risk sectors, and development of modern risk analytics. It further recommends the establishment of an Extraordinary VAT Excess Credit Regularization Program to validate and clear long-outstanding credit balances, evaluation of cross-tax offsetting options, and implementation of measures to reinforce governance, transparency, and internal control across the VAT refund system.
Botswana’s VAT performance has been steady as a share of GDP, averaging about 3-4 percent of GDP annually. An IMF CD mission in 2025-26 applied the RA-GAP top-down VAT gap model to Botswana’s data for 2017-2024 to estimate both the VAT compliance gap and policy gap. Botswana’s overall VAT gap is significant and rising, reaching 5.8 percent of GDP in 2024 (up from 4.9 percent in 2017). The increase was driven by marked deterioration in the compliance gap after 2018, while the policy gap remained relatively stable. Much of the non-compliance is concentrated in a few sectors. These results imply considerable revenue at risk and underscore the need for strengthened revenue administration efforts. High-level recommendations include building analytic capacity, improving data quality, institutionalizing regular VAT gap estimation, and integrating gap results into compliance risk management.
This technical assistance (TA) mission was conducted to support the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) in developing a first-time Residential Property Price Index (RPPI) for Kenya. The mission focused on improving data collection, refining statistical compilation methods, and building capacity aligned with international best practices. The findings highlighted significant progress in stabilizing web scraping data collection and developing the procedures for index compilation, though challenges remain in data quality and model robustness, especially outside Nairobi. The report recommends launching the RPPI by March 2026 along with a press release and comprehensive dissemination materials. Thereafter, KNBS intend to publish the data on a quarterly basis. Publishing the RPPI will be a major achievement for KNBS, but ongoing development of data collection and statistical methods should continue in the coming years.
This capacity development (CD) project financed by the Data for Decisions (D4D) Fund, was developed in response to a request from the Macro-Economic Statistics Division of Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) to provide technical assistance (TA) on rebasing the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) for Uganda (results are soon to be published).
This document summarizes the completion and main outcomes of a Technical Assistance project aimed at strengthening the capacity of Mauritania’s National Committee on Public Debt (CNDP) in public debt projection and analysis. At the request of the Mauritanian authorities, the IMF’s Institute for Capacity Development (ICD) implemented a multi-mission program between January 2024 and January 2025, combining in-country missions with sustained remote engagement. The project focused on implementing and customizing the IMF’s Public Debt Dynamics Tool (DDT), including a resource-rich country version and a natural disaster module. Through hands-on training, the CNDP strengthened its ability to produce debt projections, conduct scenario analysis, and prepare a comprehensive public debt report.
Since 2022, UK gilt yields, especially at long maturities, have risen above G7 peers, increasing borrowing costs and tightening financial conditions. This paper examines the drivers of the UK term premium — the component of yields reflecting time-varying risk compensation beyond expected short rates. In the UK, shifts in the investor base and rising importance of domestic factors may also have contributed, alongside signs of increased market fragility after the September 2022 turmoil. Maintaining credible policy frameworks and adapting debt management strategies to evolving demand conditions are key to containing the term premium.
Governments have historically used financial repression to reduce debt and fiscal pressures, yet few systematic measures of repression exist. To fill this gap, we introduce two quantity-based repression indicators grounded in a structural portfolio-choice model, exploiting the gap in government-bond demand between captive and non-captive investors. A narrow fiscal indicator captures pressure on banks to hold government bonds. A consolidated measure adds the perimeter of central bank liabilities. Applying our measures to a novel dataset of 17 advanced economies since 1920, we find that financial repression has been a persistent feature of modern history, peaking after World War II, receding during the capital account liberalization era, and rising again after the Global Financial Crisis. Our measures correlate with conditions typically associated with repression—such as high debt burdens and restricted capital mobility—along with crowding out of private investment and credit. Using a debt decomposition framework, we show that repression was a major driver of debt reduction after World War II, generating larger fiscal savings than traditional seigniorage, and has again generated fiscal savings since the Global Financial Crisis. With the conditions historically associated with elevated repression present today, our evidence suggests that financial repression may see increased use going forward.
This document summarizes the completion and main outcomes of a Technical Assistance project aimed at strengthening the capacity of Mauritania’s National Committee on Public Debt (CNDP) in public debt projection and analysis. At the request of the Mauritanian authorities, the IMF’s Institute for Capacity Development (ICD) implemented a multi-mission program between January 2024 and January 2025, combining in-country missions with sustained remote engagement. The project focused on implementing and customizing the IMF’s Public Debt Dynamics Tool (DDT), including a resource-rich country version and a natural disaster module. Through hands-on training, the CNDP strengthened its ability to produce debt projections, conduct scenario analysis, and prepare a comprehensive public debt report.
This paper uses a microsimulation model to assess the revenue potential, labor-supply and distributional effects of alternative labor tax reforms. The scope for new measures to raise significant revenue in the future through a uniform increase in labor taxes, without significantly weakening labor supply, is limited. Targeted increases in marginal tax rates toward the bottom of the earnings distribution could raise more revenue, with lower efficiency losses, but come with an equity trade-off. More fundamental reforms that improve work incentives in line with optimal tax design could deliver higher revenues with a better efficiency-equity trade-off.
