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Do the self-employed underreport their income? Evidence from Japanese panel data

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  • Niizeki, Takeshi
  • Hamaaki, Junya

Abstract

This paper examines to what extent self-employed households underreport their income to tax authorities in Japan. To this end, we employ the so-called expenditure-based approach, which essentially compares the current expenditure of self-employed and wage earner households while controlling for their income, net worth, and household characteristics. Using Japanese household-level panel data for the period 2009−2019, we find that the self-employed possibly underreport their income by 33.0–36.4%. Our findings are also robust to the different preferences (degree of risk-loving, time discount rates, etc.), planned retirement age, and degree of measurement error in expenditure between the self-employed and wage earners.

Suggested Citation

  • Niizeki, Takeshi & Hamaaki, Junya, 2023. "Do the self-employed underreport their income? Evidence from Japanese panel data," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jjieco:v:67:y:2023:i:c:s0889158322000533
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jjie.2022.101244
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Income underreporting; Self-employment; Engel curves; Life-cycle/permanent income hypothesis;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D15 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Intertemporal Household Choice; Life Cycle Models and Saving
    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • H26 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Tax Evasion and Avoidance

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