project {grattan}

Simple projections of the annual 2% samples of Australian Taxation Office tax returns.

Description

Simple projections of the annual 2% samples of Australian Taxation Office tax returns.

Usage

project(
  sample_file,
  h = 0L,
  fy.year.of.sample.file = NULL,
  WEIGHT = 50L,
  excl_vars = NULL,
  forecast.dots = list(estimator = "mean", pred_interval = 80),
  wage.series = NULL,
  lf.series = NULL,
  use_age_pop_forecast = FALSE,
  .recalculate.inflators = NA,
  .copyDT = TRUE,
  check_fy_sample_file = TRUE,
  differentially_uprate_Sw = NA,
  r_super_balance = 1.05,
  r_generic = NULL
)

Arguments

sample_file

A data.table matching a 2% sample file from the ATO. See package taxstats for an example.

h

An integer. How many years should the sample file be projected?

fy.year.of.sample.file

The financial year of sample_file. If NULL, the default, the number is inferred from the number of rows of sample_file to be one of 2012-13, 2013-14, 2014-15, 2015-16, or 2016-17.

WEIGHT

The sample weight for the sample file. (So a 2% file has WEIGHT = 50.)

excl_vars

A character vector of column names in sample_file that should not be inflated. Columns not present in the 2013-14 sample file are not inflated and nor are the columns Ind, Gender, age_range, Occ_code, Partner_status, Region, Lodgment_method, and PHI_Ind.

forecast.dots

A list containing parameters to be passed to generic_inflator.

wage.series

See wage_inflator. Note that the Sw_amt will uprated by differentially_uprate_wage (if requested).

lf.series

See lf_inflator_fy.

use_age_pop_forecast

Should the inflation of the number of taxpayers be moderated by the number of resident persons born in a certain year? If TRUE, younger ages will grow at a slightly higher rate beyond 2018 than older ages.

.recalculate.inflators

(logical, default: NA). Should generic_inflator() or CG_inflator be called to project the other variables? Adds time. Default NA means TRUE if the pre-calculated inflators are available, FALSE otherwise.

.copyDT

(logical, default: TRUE) Should a copy() of sample_file be made? If set to FALSE, will update sample_file in place, which may be necessary when memory is constrained, but is dangerous as it modifies the original data and its projection. (So if you run the same code twice you may end up with a projection 2h years ahead, not h years.)

check_fy_sample_file

(logical, default: TRUE) Should fy.year.of.sample.file be checked against sample_file? By default, TRUE, an error is raised if the base is not 2012-13, 2013-14, 2014-15, 2015-16, 2016-17, or 2017-18, and a warning is raised if the number of rows in sample_file is different to the known number of rows in the sample files.

differentially_uprate_Sw

(logical, default: NA) Should the salary and wage column (Sw_amt) be differentially uprated using (differentially_uprate_wage)? Default of NA means use differential uprating is used when fy.year.of.sample.file <= "2016-17". It is known that the Treasury stopped using differential uprating by 2019.

Selecting TRUE for fy.year.of.sample.file > "2016-17" is an error as the precalculated values are not available.

r_super_balance

The factor to inflate super balances by (annualized). Set to 1.05 for backwards compatibility. The annual superannuation bulletin of June 2019 from APRA reported 7.3% growth of funds with more than fund members over the previous 5 years and 7.9% growth over the previous ten years.

r_generic

(Present from version 2024.1.0) The factor to inflate other columns. Subject to change in future versions. If NULL, the default, an internal factor is used.

Details

Currently components of taxable income are individually inflated based on their historical trends in the ATO sample files, with the exception of:

inflated using differentially_uprate_wage.

Sw_amt

inflated using wage_inflator

Alow_ben_amt, ETP_txbl_amt, Rptbl_Empr_spr_cont_amt, Non_emp_spr_amt, MCS_Emplr_Contr, MCS_Prsnl_Contr, MCS_Othr_Contr

inflated using cpi_inflator

WRE_car_amt, WRE_trvl_amt, WRE_uniform_amt, WRE_self_amt, WRE_other_amt

inflated by lf_inflator_fy

WEIGHT

inflated by CG_inflator

Net_CG_amt, Tot_CY_CG_amt

Superannuation balances are inflated by a fixed rate of 5% p.a.

We recommend you use sample_file_1213 over sample_file_1314, unless you need the superannuation variables, as the latter suggests lower-than-recorded tax collections. However, more recent data is of course preferable.

Value

A sample file with the same number of rows as sample_file but with inflated values as a forecast for the sample file in to_fy. If WEIGHT is not already a column of sample_file, it will be added and its sum will be the predicted number of taxpayers in to_fy.