This paper examines the issue of tax evasion by enterprises through underreporting activity. We develop a view of this phenomenon as an equilibrium of the game between a businessman and an imperfectly monitored supervising official, in which a businessman can hide part of his profit and offer bribe to official. We determine conditions under which such tax evasion and bribery become wide-spread ...

We investigate the role of externalities in tax evasion arising from congestion of the auditing resources available to local tax authorities. The empirical analysis employs a novel method due to Graham (2008) that mitigates most of the problems that surround the identification of endogenous social effects [Manski (1993)]. Identification exploits the information contained in the variance of conc...

As policy makers recognize the complexity of the tax system can result in some “evasion” being due to errors, there has been increasing focus on the role of taxpayer services as a tool in the enforcement regime. Such programs can improve the image of the tax agency but the critical issue is the effect on tax reporting. While the earlier focus has been on tax evasion, tax overreporting is also a...

Tax Evasion and Social Interactions The paper extends the standard tax evasion model by allowing for social interactions. In Manski’s (1993) nomenclature, our model takes into account social conformity effects (i.e., endogenous interactions), fairness effects (i.e., exogenous interactions) and sorting effects (i.e., correlated effects). Our model is tested using experimental data. Participants ...

In this study, we explore factors that determine citizens’ tax compliance attitude in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and South Africa. The analysis is based on attitude and perception data from the new round of Afrobarometer surveys, which contain more tax-specific information than previous rounds. Using binary logit regression, we find some similarities, but also differences in factors that are corre...

Tax Evasion, Welfare Fraud, and “The Broken Windows” Effect: An Experiment in Belgium, France and the Netherlands In a series of experiments conducted in Belgium (Wallonia and Flanders), France and the Netherlands, we compare behavior regarding tax evasion and welfare dodging, with and without information about others’ behavior. Subjects have to decide between a ‘registered’ income, the realiza...

We show that the fiscal authorities of high-tax countries can lack incentives to combat profit shifting tax havens. Instead, they have focus their enforcement efforts on relocating profits booked by multinationals in other countries, crowding out transactions shift havens, and reducing global payments multinational companies. The predictions our model are motivated supported analysis two new da...

This paper studies majority voting on taxes when tax evasion is possible. We characterize the voting equilibrium where the agent with median taxed income is pivotal. Since the ranking of true incomes does not necessarily correspond to the ranking of taxed incomes, the decisive voter can differ from the median income receiver. In this case, we find unconventional patterns of redistribution, e.g....

This paper studies majority voting on taxes when tax evasion is possible. We characterize the voting equilibrium where the agent with median taxed income is pivotal. Since the ranking of true incomes does not necessarily correspond to the ranking of taxed incomes, the decisive voter can differ from the median income receiver. In this case, we find unconventional patterns of redistribution, e.g....