IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/iwqwdp/022014.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Are taxes beautiful? A survey experiment on information, tax choice and perceived adequacy of the tax burden

Author

Listed:
  • Abbiati, Lorenzo
  • Antinyan, Armenak
  • Corazzini, Luca

Abstract

We report results from a survey experiment aimed at testing whether providing information on the national public expenditure to the taxpayers and whether involving them in the process of allocating tax revenues over public goods influence the level of the adequate tax rate - the fraction of income that individuals consider adequate to pay as taxes. We find that providing information on public expenditure does not influence the level of the adequate tax rate. On the contrary, the level of the adequate tax rate substantially increases when taxpayers can get to choose the public goods to finance through their taxation.

Suggested Citation

  • Abbiati, Lorenzo & Antinyan, Armenak & Corazzini, Luca, 2014. "Are taxes beautiful? A survey experiment on information, tax choice and perceived adequacy of the tax burden," FAU Discussion Papers in Economics 02/2014, Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg, Institute for Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:iwqwdp:022014
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/95859/1/781890381.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Djawadi, Behnud Mir & Fahr, René, 2013. "The Impact of Tax Knowledge and Budget Spending Influence on Tax Compliance," IZA Discussion Papers 7255, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Li, Sherry Xin & Eckel, Catherine C. & Grossman, Philip J. & Brown, Tara Larson, 2011. "Giving to government: Voluntary taxation in the lab," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(9-10), pages 1190-1201, October.
    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. James Andreoni & Brian Erard & Jonathan Feinstein, 1998. "Tax Compliance," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 36(2), pages 818-860, June.
    5. Beuermann, Christiane & Santarius, Tilman, 2006. "Ecological tax reform in Germany: handling two hot potatoes at the same time," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 917-929, May.
    6. Nigar Hashimzade & Gareth D. Myles & Binh Tran-Nam, 2013. "Applications Of Behavioural Economics To Tax Evasion," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(5), pages 941-977, December.
    7. 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.
    8. Bernasconi, Michele & Corazzini, Luca & Kube, Sebastian & Maréchal, Michel André, 2009. "Two are better than one!: Individuals' contributions to "unpacked" public goods," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 104(1), pages 31-33, July.
    9. 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.
    10. Klok, Jacob & Larsen, Anders & Dahl, Anja & Hansen, Kirsten, 2006. "Ecological Tax Reform in Denmark: history and social acceptability," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 905-916, May.
    11. Alm, James & Jackson, Betty R. & McKee, Michael, 1993. "Fiscal exchange, collective decision institutions, and tax compliance," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 22(3), pages 285-303, December.
    12. Kallbekken, Steffen & Aasen, Marianne, 2010. "The demand for earmarking: Results from a focus group study," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(11), pages 2183-2190, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Casal, Sandro & Kogler, Christoph & Mittone, Luigi & Kirchler, Erich, 2016. "Tax compliance depends on voice of taxpayers," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 141-150.
    2. Lubomir Cingl & Tomas Lichard & Tomas Miklanek, 2022. "Mist Over a Meadow: Tax Designation Effects on Compliance," CERGE-EI Working Papers wp725, The Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education - Economics Institute, Prague.
    3. Cingl, Lubomír & Lichard, Tomáš & Miklánek, Tomáš, 2023. "Tax designation effects on compliance: An online experiment with taxpayers," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 214(C), pages 615-633.

    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. James Alm, 2019. "What Motivates Tax Compliance?," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(2), pages 353-388, April.
    2. Pickhardt, Michael & Prinz, Aloys, 2014. "Behavioral dynamics of tax evasion – A survey," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 1-19.
    3. Lee, Kangoh, 2016. "Morality, tax evasion, and equity," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 97-104.
    4. Martin Dufwenberg & Katarina Nordblom, 2022. "Tax evasion with a conscience," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 24(1), pages 5-29, February.
    5. Wilfried Anicet Kouamé, 2015. "Tax Morale and Trust in Public Institutions," Cahiers de recherche 15-14, Departement d'économique de l'École de gestion à l'Université de Sherbrooke, revised Oct 2017.
    6. Dulleck, Uwe & Fooken, Jonas & Newton, Cameron & Ristl, Andrea & Schaffner, Markus & Torgler, Benno, 2016. "Tax compliance and psychic costs: Behavioral experimental evidence using a physiological marker," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 9-18.
    7. Vossler, Christian A. & McKee, Michael & Bruner, David M., 2021. "Behavioral effects of tax withholding on tax compliance: Implications for information initiatives," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 183(C), pages 301-319.
    8. repec:qut:qubewp:001 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Colin C. Williams, 2014. "Confronting the Shadow Economy," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 15370.
    10. Colin C. Williams & Friedrich Schneider, 2016. "Measuring the Global Shadow Economy," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 16551.
    11. James, Simon & Edwards, Alison, 2010. "An annotated bibliography of tax compliance and tax compliance costs," MPRA Paper 26106, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. 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.
    13. Giulia Mascagni, 2018. "From The Lab To The Field: A Review Of Tax Experiments," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(2), pages 273-301, April.
    14. Semjén, András, 2017. "Az adózói magatartás különféle magyarázatai [Various explanations for tax compliance]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(2), pages 140-184.
    15. Traxler, Christian, 2010. "Social norms and conditional cooperative taxpayers," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 89-103, March.
    16. Orviska, Marta & Hudson, John, 2003. "Tax evasion, civic duty and the law abiding citizen," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 19(1), pages 83-102, March.
    17. 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.
    18. Sanjit Dhami & Narges Hajimoladarvish, 2020. "Mental Accounting, Loss Aversion, and Tax Evasion: Theory and Evidence," CESifo Working Paper Series 8606, CESifo.
    19. Joseph G. Eisenhauer, 2006. "The Shadow Price of Morality," Eastern Economic Journal, Eastern Economic Association, vol. 32(3), pages 437-456, Summer.
    20. Jordi Caballé & Judith Panadés, 2005. "Cost Uncertainty and Taxpayer Compliance," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 12(3), pages 239-263, May.
    21. James Alm, 2017. "Is Economics Useful for Public Policy?," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 83(4), pages 835-854, April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Tax Choice; Adequate Tax Rate; Survey Experiment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H24 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Personal Income and Other Nonbusiness Taxes and Subsidies
    • H50 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - General
    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:zbw:iwqwdp:022014. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vierlde.html .

    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.