Data for Tax me, but spend wisely? Sources of public finance and government accountability in Brazil 2015-2020

The data set comprises of 14 years panel data on municipal revenues and expenditure outcomes, primarily the quality and quantity of locally funded public education infrastructure. The resulting paper considers a program that invests in the tax capacity of Brazilian municipalities to assess whether better tax infrastructure has an effect on public service provision relative to grants. It compares how municipalities allocate increases in funds from the tax capacity program to increases in funds from tax and transfer revenues from the central government.

The main measure of public expenditure outcomes considered is municipal education infrastructure. This data is available in the annual school census conducted by the Ministry of Education. Other expenditure outcomes that complement the results on education in the data are health infrastructure and corruption.

Corruption data is obtained from the random audits for corruption in Brazil by an independent audit agency. The data on municipal health units comes from a census of health facilities conducted in 1999, 2002, 2005 and 2009.