Senior Economist (Tax Policy)

Senior Economist (Tax Policy)

Job #: req27347 Organization: World Bank Sector: Economics Grade: GG Term Duration: 4 years 0 months Recruitment Type: International Recruitment Location: Washington, DC,United States Required Language(s): English Preferred Language(s): French, Spanish, Portuguese Closing Date: 5/24/2024 (MM/DD/YYYY) at 11:59pm UTC

Description

Do you want to build a career that is truly worthwhile? Working at the World Bank Group provides a unique opportunity for you to help our clients solve their greatest development challenges. The World Bank Group is one of the largest sources of funding and knowledge for developing countries; a unique global partnership of five institutions dedicated to ending extreme poverty, increasing shared prosperity and promoting sustainable development. With 189 member countries and more than 130 locations worldwide, we work with public and private sector partners, investing in groundbreaking projects and using data, research, and technology to develop solutions to the most urgent global challenges. For more information, visit www.worldbank.org.

The Equitable Growth, Finance, and Institutions Practice Group (EFI) is one of the World Bank Group's four Practice Groups. EFI's mandate is "Growth, Finance, and Institutions for all." Our approach is to leverage public and private sector expertise, together with the International Finance Corporation (IFC), to support a data-driven reform agenda. EFI supports clients in advancing evidence-based structural reforms to build the foundations for inclusive and sustainable growth.

EFI is composed of four Global Practices (GPs), the Prospects Group, and CGAP:

• The Macroeconomics, Trade and Investment (MTI) GP provides broad macroeconomic analysis in support of countries' economic programs, including the analysis of macro-financial risks, and macroeconomic modelling services to the rest of the WBG. MTI supports sound fiscal frameworks and fiscal risk management as well as better institutions and capacity on debt management to improve efficiency of public spending and bolster macroeconomic stability.

• The Finance, Competitiveness and Innovation (FCI) GP, consisting of two directorates (the Finance directorate, and the Trade, Investment and Competitiveness (TIC) directorate) aims to support client countries to create an enabling environment in which financial stability, efficiency and firm-level solutions are provided in an integrated way to crowd in the private sector, support the creation of markets, and accelerate equitable growth.

• The Governance GP (GOV) helps countries build capable, effective, accountable, transparent and inclusive institutions that deliver citizen-centric services, facilitate private-sector growth and build trust in government; and provides fiduciary support to all Bank operations.

• The Poverty and Equity GP (POV) consists of micro, labor and development economists to build the evidence base, provide advice and operational support to ensure country policies and WBG interventions are inclusive.

• The Prospects Group provides analysis on global economic and financial developments and their impact on emerging market and developing countries. It is responsible for the publication of the Global Economic Prospects report, the Commodity Markets Outlook and Global Monthly.

• CGAP is a global partnership of more than 30 leading development organizations that works to advance the lives of poor people through financial inclusion.

MTI brings together about 530 professionals working across more than 100 countries. The Global Practice houses the Bank's country economists and professional staff with expertise in macroeconomics, fiscal policy, growth, and statistics. About fifty percent of MTI professional staff are decentralized to the field, working very closely with the Country Management Units (CMUs) and directly with clients. MTI is responsible for delivering timely policy advice to support the following lines of work: (i) designing macro-fiscal frameworks that are aligned with the goals of reducing extreme poverty and boosting shared prosperity, as well as being grounded in economic, social and environmental sustainability; (ii) supporting fiscal and debt policy sustainability; (iii) generating growth analytics and policy recommendations to sustain and boost growth; and (iv) analyzing the impact of external shocks and climate change risks on growth and the government fiscal position. MTI professionals are responsible for the preparation and delivery of Development Policy Operations using both IDA and IBRD resources, and lead or participate in the preparation of Advisory Services and Analytics, Technical Assistance and integrative outputs such as Strategic Country Diagnostics, Country Economic Memorandums and cross-sector Public Finance Reviews. Important additional engagements in macroeconomic and fiscal policies are carried out through work on debt management (including through the Debt Management Facility) and work on macro-fiscal climate issues (including in support of the Coalition of Finance Ministers for Climate Action). Knowledge and learning is a central part of MTI with work focused on 5 thematic areas: (a) macroeconomics; (b) fiscal policy; (c) growth; (d) economic management in resource-rich environments; and (e) statistics.

Within MTI, the Fiscal Policy and Sustainable Growth Unit (EMFTX) provides effective support for World Bank Group operations to strengthen countries' efforts in using tax and expenditure policy, the management of fiscal risks and fiscal planning for boosting equitable growth and underpinning macroeconomic stability. As a Global Unit, EMFTX provides technical advice, support and thought leadership on these issues to the wider GP's operational work in the Regions.

The fiscal policy work covers overall fiscal policy design, public expenditure polices, and domestic revenue mobilization. This work includes:

• Preparation of analytic work, guidelines, tools, and data that support the Bank's global engagement and the work by regional units on fiscal policy issues and quality of spending;

• Development and management of the BOOST program and Public Finance Review (PFR) Platform;

• Quality review and support to the Bank's operational work such as PFRs and DPFs;

• Fundraising and management of Fiscal Policy Umbrella trust funds;

• Cross support to regional teams on fiscal policy issues in PERs, DPOs, CEMs, etc.

• Knowledge management on fiscal policy issues and fiscal policy work;

• Knowledge sharing on fiscal policy issues, by hosting a Fiscal Policy Community of Practice and organizing knowledge sharing events such as fiscal policy brown-bags and fiscal policy training sessions;

• Providing inputs to and managing fiscal policy aspects of corporate initiatives such as CPIAs.

• Engagement with other international stakeholders such as the IMF and the OECD on fiscal policy issues.

POSITION

The Macroeconomics, Trade and Investment Global Practice (MTI) is seeking to recruit a highly qualified candidate for the position of Tax Policy Senior Economist to work in the MTI's unit for "Fiscal Policy and Sustainable Growth" (EMFTX). The Unit seeks a professional with strong technical skills and hands-on experience with addressing tax policy issues in developing countries. The Senior Economist will work on country tax policy analysis in general, and domestic resource mobilization through tax reform in developing and emerging economies. He/She is expected to provide technical leadership on tax issues across regions using World Bank instruments (Advisory Services and Analytics and Lending), contribute to the unit's interaction with senior management and partners, and lead research and knowledge development.

The position is based in Washington D.C., USA.

DUTIES AND ACCOUNTABILITIES

This position is for a Senior Expert in Tax Policy within the Fiscal Policy and Sustainable Growth Unit. The incumbent will lead, supervise, and support the unit's analytical program on taxation, including reforms for domestic revenue mobilization, revenue management, and results measurement across countries. Additionally, the Senior Economist will contribute to development of policy operations and results-based operations across the region. They will also participate in cross-GP teams focusing on institutional reform and transformation.

The selected candidate will be expected to undertake the following tasks:

• Lead and/or contribute to the analysis of tax policies within countries' tax systems, with a particular emphasis on developing and emerging economies. This involves assessing the efficiency, effectiveness, simplicity, and fairness of tax systems. Identify opportunities and constraints for tax reforms and formulate country-specific recommendations for tax policy reform.

• Carry out an empirical analysis of existing components of the tax systems and potential reforms, including both micro-data analysis and simulations and more aggregate/macro-based approaches.

• Providing knowledge products, tools, and data to speed-up and improve project quality, analytical work, and policy dialogue.

• Lead and contribute to technical inputs to analytic work and advisory services, and/or supervising the preparation of analytical products (ASA) and other relevant technical reports to clients in close collaboration with the CMUs, Program Leaders, relevant Task Team Leaders and sector experts within and outside the Bank. Lead technical assistance on revenue mobilization at the country level.

• Contribute as team member and lead components of a broad range lending operations, including integrative and cross-cutting work such as tax policy for green growth and human capital development.

• Mobilizing resources to support task teams working on taxation, macro related aspects of climate change, and fiscal policy.

• Supporting the corporate agenda through analytical inputs, briefs, and monitoring of the Bank's corporate commitments on tax (e.g., under IDA and Financing for Development) and climate change.

• Collaborating with clients and partners such as the IMF, OECD, UN, and donor agencies to give voice to developing countries in international fora and establish partnerships such as the Platform for Collaboration on Tax and the Prosperity Collaborative.

Selection Criteria

• The successful candidate will be a professional with extensive experience on analytical, advisory and operational work in economics, fiscal, or macroeconomic issues, as relevant for this position.

• Minimum Master's degree (PhD. Preferred) in Economics, Public finance, Tax policy or similar professional qualifications.

• At least eight years of work experience covering tax policy. Experience of work in the public sector (including advisory work) on taxation would be an advantage.

• Demonstrated analytical and operational skills in public sector economic and institutional reforms and practical experience working with different lending instruments (e.g., Investment Project Financing, Program for Results, Development Policy Operations and Trust Funds) in the design and delivery of projects and/or studies in areas key to tax reforms in developing countries.

• Authored or co-authored reports/publications showing analysis of tax policy on topics such as: a) tax incentives, b) carbon taxation, c) international taxation, and d) extractive industries, etc.

• Built or used tax models for policy work, such as: a) macro models such as OLG models, b) microsimulation models, c) tax gap models will be an advantage.

• Familiarity with broader macro-fiscal reform and integration of tax issues in that context.

• Hand-on experience working with administrative tax data will an advantage.

• Strong interpersonal skills and the capacity to work in teams across organizational boundaries within a multi-cultural environment.

• Confirmed knowledge of statistical software such as R or STATA

• Excellent oral and written communication skills in English is required. Fluency in French and/or Spanish, Portuguese would be an advantage.

Required Competencies

• General Economic Knowledge and Analytical Skills

• Possesses a track record of intellectual leadership and ability to integrate economic-specific knowledge and specific micro/sector fields of expertise; provides quality assurance and assesses technical soundness of work/reports.

• Knowledge and Experience in the Development Arena

• Influences the design and execution of major policy and/or research initiatives; conceives and promotes innovations in development policies, project design, organization and management to improve operational and sector work.

• Policy Dialogue Skills

• Has a track record of conducting effective policy dialogue with country counterparts; communicates and defends difficult issues and positions to senior bank management and government officials.

• Integrative Skills

• Possesses in-depth understanding of Bank resources in all areas of work in the Practice Group, and proven fungibility.

• Macroeconomic Skills and Country Economics Experience

• Has strong record of task leadership of complex policy-based lending operations, major economic reports or other published work relating to macro-economic, fiscal, growth, structural policy and poverty issues.

• Written and Verbal Communication

• Demonstrates a strong command of all forms of communication and delivers messages in a consistently effective, timely and engaging manner.

• Lead and Innovate

• Inspires and influences others to drive innovation.

• Deliver Results for Clients- Acts as a trusted, strategic advisor, partnering with clients to deliver results.

• Collaborate Within Teams and Across Boundaries

• Leads collaboration across WBG and with partners drawing on robust professional networks.

• Create, Apply and Share Knowledge

• Establishes an environment where knowledge is created, applied and shared.

• Make Smart Decisions

• Makes timely decisions that have a broad impact.

World Bank Group Core Competencies

The World Bank Group offers comprehensive benefits, including a retirement plan; medical, life and disability insurance; and paid leave, including parental leave, as well as reasonable accommodations for individuals with disabilities.

We are proud to be an equal opportunity and inclusive employer with a dedicated and committed workforce, and do not discriminate based on gender, gender identity, religion, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or disability.

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