{"type":"script","doc_desc":{"producers":[{"name":"Reproducibility WBG","abbr":"DECDI","affiliation":"World Bank - Development Impact Department","role":"Verification and preparation of metadata"}],"prod_date":"2026-07-15","version":"1"},"project_desc":{"authoring_entity":[{"name":"Christopher Hoy","affiliation":"World Bank","email":"choy@worldbank.org"},{"name":"Ruggero Doino","affiliation":"World Bank","email":"rdoino@worldbank.org"},{"name":"Matias Strehl-Pessina","affiliation":"University of California, Santa Barbara","email":"mstrehlpessina@ucsb.edu"},{"name":"Darian Naidoo","affiliation":"World Bank","email":"dnaidoo@worldbank.org"},{"name":"Kingtau Mambon","affiliation":"University of Papua New Guinea","email":"kingtau.mambon@upng.ac.pg"},{"name":"Bobby Kunda","affiliation":"University of Papua New Guinea","email":"bobby.kunda@upng.ac.pg"}],"title_statement":{"title":"Reproducibility package for Who Benefits From Food Tax Exemptions In Lower-Income\nSettings? Evidence On Pass-Through And Incidence","idno":"RR_PNG_2026_696"},"data_statement":"Some data is restricted and has not been included in the reproducibility package. For more details, please refer to the README file. ","software":[{"name":"R","version":"4.6"},{"name":"Stata","version":"19.5 MP"},{"name":"Excel"},{"name":"Python","version":"3.11"}],"scripts":[{"title":"Reproducibility package for Who Benefits From Food Tax Exemptions In Lower-Income\nSettings? Evidence On Pass-Through And Incidence","date":"2026-07","notes":"Computational reproducibility verified by Development Impact (DECDI) Analytics team, World Bank.","instructions":"See README in reproducibility package.","file_name":"RR_PNG_2026_696","zip_package":"RR_PNG_2026_696.zip","dependencies":"R dependencies are listed in the file renv.lock. Stata dependencies are listed in the ado folder."}],"repository_uri":[{"name":"Reproducible Research Repository (World Bank)","uri":"https:\/\/reproducibility.worldbank.org"}],"production_date":"2026-07-15","abstract":"Tax exemptions for basic items exist worldwide, typically justified by governments as a way to reduce the cost of living for poorer households. We study the unanticipated removal of consumption taxes on selected food items in Papua New Guinea by conducting a difference-in-differences analysis using administrative data, a supermarket price census, web-scraped online prices, and a nationally representative, household phone survey panel. We find complete pass-through in formal supermarkets in central urban districts, where retail competition is strong, but no pass-through in informal stores or rural areas, where poorer households mainly shop. Only 16 percent of the foregone revenue accrued to the poorest two quintiles, while the richest two quintiles and stores\/wholesalers each captured almost 40 percent of the benefits. This degree of regressivity and variation in pass-through was unanticipated by 237 experts who participated in a prediction survey. Using a static MVPF-style comparison, we show that universal cash transfers would generate roughly two and a half times as much Q1-weighted value per fiscal dollar as the tax exemption. Our findings demonstrate that food tax exemptions are inherently regressive in lower-income settings, due to high informality, substantial market segmentation, and positive income elasticity of demand for basic food.","geographic_units":[{"name":"Papua New Guinea","code":"PNG"}],"keywords":[{"name":"Public Finance"},{"name":"Industrial Organization"},{"name":"Taxation"},{"name":"Incidence"},{"name":"Pass-Through"}],"topics":[{"id":"H20","uri":"https:\/\/www.aeaweb.org\/econlit\/jelCodes.php?view=jel","vocabulary":"Journal of Economic Literature (JEL)","name":"General","parent_id":"H2"},{"id":" H22","uri":"https:\/\/www.aeaweb.org\/econlit\/jelCodes.php?view=jel","vocabulary":"Journal of Economic Literature (JEL)","name":"Incidence","parent_id":"H2"},{"id":" H23","uri":"https:\/\/www.aeaweb.org\/econlit\/jelCodes.php?view=jel","vocabulary":"Journal of Economic Literature (JEL)","name":"Externalities \u2022 Redistributive Effects \u2022 Environmental Taxes and Subsidies","parent_id":"H2"},{"id":" L11","uri":"https:\/\/www.aeaweb.org\/econlit\/jelCodes.php?view=jel","vocabulary":"Journal of Economic Literature (JEL)","name":"Production, Pricing, and Market Structure \u2022 Size Distribution of Firms","parent_id":"L1"}],"output":[{"type":"Working Paper","description":"Policy Research Working Papers (PRWP)","title":"Who Benefits From Food Tax Exemptions In Lower-Income\nSettings? Evidence On Pass-Through And Incidence"}],"language":[{"name":"English","code":"EN"}],"technology_requirements":"Run time: 20 minutes. ","disclaimer":"The materials in the reproducibility packages are distributed as they were prepared by the staff of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development\/The World Bank. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this event do not necessarily reflect the views of the World Bank, the Executive Directors of the World Bank, or the governments they represent. The World Bank does not guarantee the accuracy of the materials included in the reproducibility package.","license":[{"name":"MIT License","uri":"https:\/\/opensource.org\/license\/mit"},{"name":"World Bank IGO Rider","uri":"https:\/\/github.com\/worldbank\/metadata-editor\/blob\/main\/WB-IGO-RIDER.md"}],"contacts":[{"name":"Christopher Hoy","affiliation":"World Bank","email":"choy@worldbank.org"},{"name":"Reproducibility WBG","affiliation":"World Bank","email":"reproducibility@worldbank.org"}],"datasets":[{"name":"Papua New Guinea, High Frequency Phone Survey Q2 2023 to Q1 2025, Continuous Data Collection 2023","note":"Filename: Data\/Raw\/phone_survey\/20260429\/PNG_HFPS_Household_weighted_wFood.dta. Extract derived from the Pacific Data Hub catalog entry SPC_PNG_2023_HFPS-Q2. \n","access_type":"Data access requires purchase or human approval and is not included in the reproducibility package.","license":"Licensed","license_uri":"https:\/\/microdata.pacificdata.org\/index.php\/terms-of-use#tab_3","citation":"Pacific Community (SPC) and World Bank. 2023. Papua New Guinea, High Frequency Phone Survey Q2 2023 to Q1 2025, Continuous Data Collection 2023 [dataset]. Ref. SPC_PNG_2023_HFPS-Q2. Pacific Data Hub Microdata Catalog. Accessed 2026-04.","uri":"https:\/\/microdata.pacificdata.org\/index.php\/catalog\/877"},{"name":"Who Benefits from Food Tax Exemptions in Lower-Income Settings? Evidence on Pass-Through and Incidence in Papua New Guinea Data","note":"Filenames: experts_survey.csv; pom_price_collection.xlsx; products_2025_05_12_foodpro.csv, products_2025_05_19_foodpro.csv, products_2025_05_26_foodpro.csv, products_2025_06_02_foodpro.csv, products_2025_06_09_foodpro.csv, products_2025_06_16_foodpro.csv, products_2025_06_23_foodpro.csv, products_2025_06_30_foodpro.csv, products_2025_07_07_foodpro.csv, products_2025_07_15_foodpro.csv, products_2025_07_21_foodpro.csv, products_2025_07_28_foodpro.csv, products_2025_08_04_foodpro.csv; products_2025_04_29_rh.csv, products_2025_05_05_rh.csv, products_2025_05_12_rh.csv, products_2025_05_19_rh.csv, products_2025_05_26_rh.csv, products_2025_06_02_rh.csv, products_2025_06_09_rh.csv, products_2025_06_16_rh.csv, products_2025_06_23_rh.csv, products_2025_06_30_rh.csv, products_2025_07_07_rh.csv, products_2025_07_15_rh.csv, products_2025_07_21_rh.csv, products_2025_07_28_rh.csv, products_2025_08_04_rh.csv. The deposit combines the three original data collections carried out by the authors for the paper: (i) an expert prediction survey fielded via Qualtrics (2025-07 to 2025-09), from which direct identifiers \u2014 respondent email address, IP address, and geolocation \u2014 were removed before archiving; (ii) a store price collection conducted through field work in Port Moresby (2025-05 to 2025-10), from which enumerator names were removed before archiving; and (iii) online store prices collected via web scraping of rhtradingpng.com and fpr.com.pg (2025-04 to 2025-08), where the archived files contain prices, standardized item codes, and collection dates, and verbatim product text and URLs are excluded. The files are placed under Data\/Raw\/experts_survey\/, Data\/Raw\/store_collection\/, and Data\/Raw\/e_store_collection\/ (subfolders foodpro\/ and rh\/), matching the paths in data_hash_report.csv","access_type":"Data is forthcoming in the World Bank Microdata Library.","license":"Public Use Files","license_uri":"https:\/\/microdata.worldbank.org\/terms-of-use#public_use","citation":"World Bank. 2025. Who Benefits from Food Tax Exemptions in Lower-Income Settings? Evidence on Pass-Through and Incidence in Papua New Guinea Data [dataset]. Forthcoming at https:\/\/microdata.worldbank.org\/. ","uri":"Forthcoming at https:\/\/microdata.worldbank.org\/"},{"name":"2011 Census Population by District, Papua New Guinea","note":"Filename: Data\/Raw\/census\/png_admpop_adm2_2011_v2.csv. Compiled by the Papua New Guinea National Statistical Office and distributed via the Humanitarian Data Exchange (HDX). ","access_type":"Data is publicly available and included in the reproducibility package.","license":"Creative Commons Attribution for Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY-IGO)","license_uri":"https:\/\/data.humdata.org\/dataset\/cod-ps-png","citation":"Papua New Guinea National Statistical Office. 2011. Papua New Guinea - Subnational Population Statistics: Population by District (2011) [dataset]. Humanitarian Data Exchange (HDX).","uri":"https:\/\/data.humdata.org\/dataset\/cod-ps-png"},{"name":"Retail Price Index (RPI), Papua New Guinea","note":"Filename: Data\/Raw\/rpi\/World_Bank__RPI_Data_Request.xlsx. \nProvided by the Bank of Papua New Guinea under terms that do not allow redistribution, so the data are not included in the reproducibility package. \nOnly derived, non-identifying results appear in the paper. \nAccess can be requested from the data provider at ilibitino@bankpng.gov.pg. Place under Data\/Raw\/rpi\/ matching the paths in data_hash_report.csv. Accessed 2026-05.","access_type":"Data access was granted directly to the study authors by the data owners\/managers. It was obtained with a custom data license that does not allow for redistribution and it is not included in the reproducibility package.","license":"Custom license","citation":"Bank of Papua New Guinea. 2026. Retail Price Index (RPI), Papua New Guinea [dataset]. Unpublished data. Accessed 2026-05."},{"name":"Administrative Prices, Papua New Guinea ","note":"Filenames: Data\/Raw\/nso\/Comparision_Group.xlsx and Data\/Raw\/nso\/GST exempt goods WB tracking - Edited.xlsx. \nAdministrative price data provided by the Papua New Guinea National Statistical Office under restricted terms; the data are not included in the reproducibility package, and only derived, non-identifying results appear in the paper. Access can be requested from the data provider at barry.lei@nso.gov.pg. \nPlace under Data\/Raw\/nso\/ matching the paths in data_hash_report.csv. Accessed 2026-04.","access_type":"Data access was granted directly to the study authors by the data owners\/managers. It was obtained with a custom data license that does not allow for redistribution and it is not included in the reproducibility package.","license":"Custom license","citation":"Papua New Guinea National Statistical Office. 2026. Administrative Prices, Papua New Guinea [dataset]. Unpublished data. Accessed 2026-04.","uri":"https:\/\/www.nso.gov.pg\/statistics\/economy\/consumer-price-index"},{"name":"Quarterly Consumer Price Index (CPI), December Quarter 2025","note":"Filename: Data\/Raw\/nso\/Table_13_December_Qtr_2025.xlsx. Published CPI release (Table 13) from the Papua New Guinea National Statistical Office, publicly available from the NSO website. ","access_type":"Data is publicly available and included in the reproducibility package.","license":"Public","citation":"Papua New Guinea National Statistical Office. 2026. Consumer Price Index, December Quarter 2025 [dataset]. Port Moresby: National Statistical Office. Accessed 2026-04.","uri":"https:\/\/www.nso.gov.pg\/statistics\/economy\/consumer-price-index"},{"name":"Business Sentiment Survey, Papua New Guinea","note":"Filenames: Data\/Raw\/sentiment\/Copy_of_Wholesale_retail_competition.xlsx and Data\/Raw\/sentiment\/World_Bank_request.xlsx. Derived from the Bank of Papua New Guinea Business Sentiment Survey and provided under terms that do not allow redistribution, so the data are not included in the reproducibility package. Only derived, non-identifying results appear in the paper. Access can be requested from the data provider at ilibitino@bankpng.gov.pg. Place under Data\/Raw\/sentiment\/ matching the paths in data_hash_report.csv. Accessed 2026-07.","access_type":"Data access was granted directly to the study authors by the data owners\/managers. It was obtained with a custom data license that does not allow for redistribution and it is not included in the reproducibility package.","license":"Custom license","citation":"Bank of Papua New Guinea. 2026. Business Sentiment Survey [dataset]. Unpublished data. Accessed 2026-07."}],"reproduction_instructions":"To reproduce the findings of this paper, a new user should do the following:\n\n1. Obtain the data (see the data section) and place the files under `Data\/Raw\/\u2026`, following the folder names listed in `data_hash_report.csv`.\n2. Open the `main` do-file and set the top-level directory on the single line marked for that purpose.\n3. Run the `main` do-file. Note that there is a pause partway through the script.\n4. Open the `main` R script, set the same directory on line 26, and run the script in full.\n5. Return to the `main` do-file and press any key. It runs the analysis and writes all tables and figures to `Outputs\/`.\n\nBecause some of the data is restricted, the exhibits generated by the replicators are included in the package so that interested users can review them against the published paper.\n\n**Note:** The package contains Python code that was not run by the replicators. It is a web-scraping script that would have produced a different dataset than the one used in the paper, since the live sites change over time. The data resulting from that code will instead be deposited in the Microdata Library along with the rest of the non-restricted data. Running the Python code is therefore not needed to reproduce the findings of this paper and was not run by the replicators.","technology_environment":"Paper exhibits were reproduced on a computer with the following specifications:\n\u2022 OS: macOS\n\u2022 Processor: Apple M4 Pro\n\u2022 Memory available: 24 GB\n\u2022 Software version: Stata 19.5 MP, R 4.6."},"datacite":{"creators":[{"givenName":"Christopher","familyName":"Hoy","nameType":"Personal","affiliation":[{"name":"World Bank","affiliationIdentifier":"https:\/\/ror.org\/00ae7jd04","affiliationIdentifierScheme":"ROR","schemeUri":"https:\/\/ror.org"}]},{"givenName":"Ruggero","familyName":"Doino","nameType":"Personal","affiliation":[{"name":"World Bank","affiliationIdentifier":"https:\/\/ror.org\/00ae7jd04","affiliationIdentifierScheme":"ROR","schemeUri":"https:\/\/ror.org"}]},{"givenName":"Matias","familyName":"Strehl-Pessina","nameType":"Personal","affiliation":[{"name":"University of California, Santa Barbara","affiliationIdentifier":"https:\/\/ror.org\/02t274463","affiliationIdentifierScheme":"ROR","schemeUri":"https:\/\/ror.org"}]},{"givenName":"Darian","familyName":"Naidoo","nameType":"Personal","affiliation":[{"name":"World Bank","affiliationIdentifier":"https:\/\/ror.org\/00ae7jd04","affiliationIdentifierScheme":"ROR","schemeUri":"https:\/\/ror.org"}]},{"givenName":"Kingtau","familyName":"Mambon","nameType":"Personal","affiliation":[{"name":"University of Papua New Guinea","affiliationIdentifier":"https:\/\/ror.org\/05jxf0p38","affiliationIdentifierScheme":"ROR","schemeUri":"https:\/\/ror.org"}]},{"givenName":"Bobby","familyName":"Kunda","nameType":"Personal","affiliation":[{"name":"University of Papua New Guinea","affiliationIdentifier":"https:\/\/ror.org\/05jxf0p38","affiliationIdentifierScheme":"ROR","schemeUri":"https:\/\/ror.org"}]}],"titles":[{"lang":"en","title":"Reproducibility package for Who Benefits From Food Tax Exemptions In Lower-Income\nSettings? Evidence On Pass-Through And Incidence"},{"title":"RR_PNG_2026_696","titleType":"Other"}],"publisher":"World Bank","publicationYear":"2026","types":{"resourceType":"Reproducibility package","resourceTypeGeneral":"Other"},"url":"https:\/\/reproducibility.worldbank.org\/index.php\/catalog\/study\/RR_PNG_2026_696","language":"en"},"tags":[{"tag":"DOI"},{"tag":"Open Code"},{"tag":"Restricted Data"}],"schematype":"script"}