IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/aosoci/v33y2008i7-8p684-703.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

An egocentric model of the relations among the opportunity to underreport, social norms, ethical beliefs, and underreporting behavior

Author

Listed:
  • Blanthorne, Cindy
  • Kaplan, Steven

Abstract

A model of the relations among taxpayers' opportunity, social norms, ethical beliefs, and tax compliance is proposed and tested using structural equation modeling. High opportunity taxpayers, who may personally benefit from evasion, judged evasion as less unethical than low opportunity taxpayers. High and low opportunity taxpayers judged social norms similarly. Further, ethical beliefs partially (fully) mediate the relation between opportunity (social norms) and underreporting. Implications from our study to tax compliance researchers and policy makers are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Blanthorne, Cindy & Kaplan, Steven, 2008. "An egocentric model of the relations among the opportunity to underreport, social norms, ethical beliefs, and underreporting behavior," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 33(7-8), pages 684-703.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:aosoci:v:33:y:2008:i:7-8:p:684-703
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0361-3682(08)00008-1
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Reckers, Philip M.J. & Sanders, Debra L. & Roark, Stephen J., 1994. "The Influence of Ethical Attitudes on Taxpayer Compliance," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 47(4), pages 825-836, December.
    2. Webley, Paul & Cole, Michaela & Eidjar, Ole-Petter, 2001. "The prediction of self-reported and hypothetical tax-evasion: Evidence from England, France and Norway," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 22(2), pages 141-155, April.
    3. Erard, Brian & Feinstein, Jonathan S, 1994. "The Role of Moral Sentiments and Audit Perceptions in Tax Compliance," Public Finance = Finances publiques, , vol. 49(Supplemen), pages 70-89.
    4. Kaplan, Steven E. & Reckers, Philip M. J. & Roark, Stephen J., 1988. "An attribution theory analysis of tax evasion related judgments," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 13(4), pages 371-379, June.
    5. Donna Bobek & Robin Roberts & John Sweeney, 2007. "The Social Norms of Tax Compliance: Evidence from Australia, Singapore, and the United States," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 74(1), pages 49-64, August.
    6. Ajzen, Icek, 1991. "The theory of planned behavior," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 179-211, December.
    7. Etzioni, Amitai, 1988. "Normative-affective factors: Toward a new decision-making model," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 9(2), pages 125-150, June.
    8. Alm, James & McClelland, Gary H. & Schulze, William D., 1992. "Why do people pay taxes?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 21-38, June.
    9. Alm, James & Sanchez, Isabel & de Juan, Ana, 1995. "Economic and Noneconomic Factors in Tax Compliance," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(1), pages 3-18.
    10. Wenzel, Michael, 2005. "Misperceptions of social norms about tax compliance: From theory to intervention," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 26(6), pages 862-883, December.
    11. Brian Erard & Jonathan Feinstein, 1994. "The Role of Moral Sentiments and Audit Perceptions in Tax Compliance," Carleton Industrial Organization Research Unit (CIORU) 94-03, Carleton University, Department of Economics.
    12. Babcock, Linda, et al, 1995. "Biased Judgments of Fairness in Bargaining," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(5), pages 1337-1343, December.
    13. Simon C. Parker, 2003. "Does Tax Evasion Affect Occupational Choice?," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 65(3), pages 379-394, July.
    14. Reckers, Philip M.J. & Sanders, Debra L. & Roark, Stephen J., 1994. "The Influence of Ethical Attitudes on Taxpayer Compliance," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association, vol. 47(4), pages 825-36, December.
    15. Wenzel, Michael, 2004. "An analysis of norm processes in tax compliance," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 25(2), pages 213-228, April.
    16. Wouters, Marc & Anderson, James C. & Wynstra, Finn, 2005. "The adoption of total cost of ownership for sourcing decisions--a structural equations analysis," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 30(2), pages 167-191, February.
    17. Allingham, Michael G. & Sandmo, Agnar, 1972. "Income tax evasion: a theoretical analysis," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 1(3-4), pages 323-338, November.
    18. Wenzel, Michael, 2005. "Motivation or rationalisation? Causal relations between ethics, norms and tax compliance," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 491-508, August.
    19. Antonides, Gerrit & Robben, Henry S. J., 1995. "True positives and false alarms in the detection of tax evasion," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 617-640, December.
    20. Thompson, Leigh & Loewenstein, George, 1992. "Egocentric interpretations of fairness and interpersonal conflict," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 176-197, March.
    21. Pommerehne, Werner W & Hart, Albert & Frey, Bruno S, 1994. "Tax Morale, Tax Evasion and the Choice of Policy Instruments in Different Political Systems," Public Finance = Finances publiques, , vol. 49(Supplemen), pages 52-69.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jeffrey Cohen & Gil Manzon & Valentina Zamora, 2015. "Contextual and Individual Dimensions of Taxpayer Decision Making," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 126(4), pages 631-647, February.
    2. Hallsworth, Michael & List, John A. & Metcalfe, Robert D. & Vlaev, Ivo, 2017. "The behavioralist as tax collector: Using natural field experiments to enhance tax compliance," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 148(C), pages 14-31.
    3. Gebhard Kirchgässner, 2011. "Tax Morale, Tax Evasion and the Shadow Economy," Chapters, in: Friedrich Schneider (ed.), Handbook on the Shadow Economy, chapter 10, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    4. Pickhardt, Michael & Prinz, Aloys, 2014. "Behavioral dynamics of tax evasion – A survey," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 1-19.
    5. Kristina Murphy, 2007. "Procedural Justice and the Regulation of Tax Compliance Behaviour: The Moderating Role of Personal Norms," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper0731, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    6. Sinning, Mathias & Zhang, Yinjunjie, 2023. "Social norms or enforcement? A natural field experiment to improve traffic and parking fine compliance," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 210(C), pages 43-60.
    7. Wenzel, Michael, 2005. "Motivation or rationalisation? Causal relations between ethics, norms and tax compliance," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 491-508, August.
    8. Donna Bobek & Amy Hageman & Charles Kelliher, 2013. "Analyzing the Role of Social Norms in Tax Compliance Behavior," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 115(3), pages 451-468, July.
    9. Fábio Pereira Silva & Reinaldo Guerreiro & Eduardo Flores, 2019. "Voluntary versus enforced tax compliance: the slippery slope framework in the Brazilian context," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 66(2), pages 147-180, June.
    10. Nordblom, Katarina, 2017. "Tax Morale and Policy Intervention," Working Papers in Economics 711, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    11. Fortin, Bernard & Lacroix, Guy & Villeval, Marie-Claire, 2007. "Tax evasion and social interactions," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(11-12), pages 2089-2112, December.
    12. Demirbag, Mehmet & Frecknall-Hughes, Jane & Glaister, Keith W. & Tatoglu, Ekrem, 2013. "Ethics and taxation: A cross-national comparison of UK and Turkish firms," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 100-111.
    13. Bernasconi, Michele & Corazzini, Luca & Seri, Raffaello, 2014. "Reference dependent preferences, hedonic adaptation and tax evasion: Does the tax burden matter?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 103-118.
    14. Michele Bernasconi, Luca Corazzini, Raffaello Seri, 2012. "Tax Evasion: Does the Tax Burden Matter?," ISLA Working Papers 43, ISLA, Centre for research on Latin American Studies and Transition Economies, Universita' Bocconi, Milano, Italy.
    15. Korndörfer, Martin & Krumpal, Ivar & Schmukle, Stefan C., 2014. "Measuring and explaining tax evasion: Improving self-reports using the crosswise model," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 18-32.
    16. Torgler, Benno, 2003. "To evade taxes or not to evade: that is the question," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 283-302, July.
    17. James, Simon & Edwards, Alison, 2010. "An annotated bibliography of tax compliance and tax compliance costs," MPRA Paper 26106, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Torgler, Benno & Schneider, Friedrich & Schaltegger, Christoph A., 2007. "With or Against the People? The Impact of a Bottom-Up Approach on Tax Morale and the Shadow Economy," Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics, Working Paper Series qt6331x6vz, Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics.
    19. Nordblom, Katarina & Zamac, Jovan, 2011. "Endogenous Norm Formation Over the Life Cycle – The Case of Tax Evasion," Working Paper Series, Center for Fiscal Studies 2011:10, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
    20. Diana Onu & Lynne Oats & Erich Kirchler & Andre Julian Hartmann, 2019. "Gaming the System: An Investigation of Small Business Owners’ Attitudes to Tax Avoidance, Tax Planning, and Tax Evasion," Games, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-17, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:aosoci:v:33:y:2008:i:7-8:p:684-703. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/aos .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.