Opening the Black Box: towards a transparent and widely-used tax-benefit model for the UK (UKMOD)
Tax-benefit models are used to answer “what if” questions about the effects of specific tax and benefit
reforms on household incomes. Arithmetic calculations are carried out for each household in a dataset that
is representative of the population and thereby the effects on the overall public budget, across the
distribution of income and by household characteristics are obtained. Such analysis is regularly performed
for Budget and other Government policy announcements and is also highly relevant for the design of
alternative reforms and new policy instruments.
There are a number of UK tax-benefit models that are regularly maintained and updated but they are not
widely available outside the organisation that owns them. The exception, up to 2020, was the UK component of the EU
model, EUROMOD. This project consolidated EUROMOD-UK as a new reliable, flexible, accessible and
transparent tax-benefit model for the UK and its constituent regions, adapting and extending it to increase its relevance for UK policy analysis. The new model is called UKMOD, and since the discontinuation of EUROMOD-UK following Brexit, has a separate existence on its own.
We also developes a simplified approach to using selected parts of the model by non-expert users. The
overall aim was to meet the demand for tax-benefit modelling capacity among UK organisations (and
individuals) and to promote its use more widely as a way to improve the evidence base to better inform
current policy debates.
Start date
01 Oct 2018
End date
30 Sep 2021
Funder
Nuffield Foundation