Exploratory Spatial Data Analysis of Furusato Nozei: A Tax Donation Program in Japan

Abstract

This study highlights spatial associations of the hometown tax payment, which is a tax donation program to municipalities of taxpayers' favorite choices in Japan and is called as Furusato Nozei. The program has become an important source of revenue for low-funded municipalities. With increasing donations, the disparity between municipalities widens. To the best of our knowledge, thus far, no study has discussed the spatial characteristics from a quantitative perspective. In this study, a local indicator of spatial associations, the local Moran statistic, is used for hotspot analysis of donations made to each municipality. The results indicate the presence of spatial agglomerations, where taxpayers are aware of high return rates of their donations or reconstruction assistance for the Great East Japan Earthquake. The results also suggest that when adjacent to a municipality receiving the donation higher than the average, municipalities can be 7.8% more likely to become the same class.