Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 2 October 2014
25. Deputy Stephen S. Donnelly asked the Minister for Finance if he will provide a distributional analysis of budget 2015, by income decile, gender and age group, either on budget day, or within two weeks thereafter, in order that Dáil Éireann has that information available to debate the budget before voting on the relevant Bills. [37066/14]
View answerMy Department produces a large range of documentation to accompany the Budget. This documentation includes tables of distributional analysis at set income levels, of income tax, USC and PRSI changes. These tables also include changes to certain social welfare payments where appropriate. In addition, a number of illustrative cases are developed and published.
The Department of Social Protection usually publishes a social impact assessment (SIA) of the main welfare and tax measures, which estimates the likely distributive effects of welfare and tax policies on household income and social groups. This assessment is based on the tax and welfare micro-simulation model (Switch), developed by the ESRI, and is generally published approximately 4 to 5 months after the Budget. This combined social impact assessment takes time to finalise because of the many technical and policy issues involved. Therefore it is not possible to provide the information sought by the Deputy within the timeframe set out in his question.
