IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/pubfin/v53y2025i4p415-439.html

Leaving Money on the Table: Nudging Taxpayers to Claim a Refundable State Income Tax Credit

Author

Listed:
  • John D. Stavick
  • HoaPhu Tran

Abstract

In 2020, Nebraska sought to provide property tax relief through an income tax credit against public school property tax levies. Millions of dollars of the tax credit were offered and went unclaimed. The state responded by mailing notifications to 6,000 taxpayers that informed them of the opportunity to claim the missed credit using a simplified form. Treatment effects estimated using taxpayer microdata show that the credit take-up rate of notified taxpayers was 20 percentage points greater than that of 9,905 taxpayers selected for potential notification but received no contact. Taxpayer subgroups, such as self-preparers, married taxpayers that filed jointly, and rural taxpayers were among those most responsive to notification.

Suggested Citation

  • John D. Stavick & HoaPhu Tran, 2025. "Leaving Money on the Table: Nudging Taxpayers to Claim a Refundable State Income Tax Credit," Public Finance Review, , vol. 53(4), pages 415-439, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:pubfin:v:53:y:2025:i:4:p:415-439
    DOI: 10.1177/10911421251327176
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/10911421251327176
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/10911421251327176?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Elizabeth Linos & Allen Prohofsky & Aparna Ramesh & Jesse Rothstein & Matthew Unrath, 2022. "Can Nudges Increase Take-Up of the EITC? Evidence from Multiple Field Experiments," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 14(4), pages 432-452, November.
    2. Joshua D. Angrist & Jörn-Steffen Pischke, 2009. "Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist's Companion," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 8769, December.
    3. 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.
    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. Antinyan, Armenak & Asatryan, Zareh, 2019. "Nudging for tax compliance: A meta-analysis," ZEW Discussion Papers 19-055, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    2. Dina Pomeranz, 2017. "Impact Evaluation Methods in Public Economics," Public Finance Review, , vol. 45(1), pages 10-43, January.
    3. Chlond, Bettina & Goeschl, Timo & Kesternich, Martin & Werthschulte, Madeline, 2024. "Transporting behavioral insights to low-income household: A field experiment on energy efficiency investmen," ZEW Discussion Papers 24-079, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    4. Koebel, Kourtney & Pohler, Dionne, 2024. "The effect of an unconditional government income transfer on the labour supply of lowincome workers," CLEF Working Paper Series 76, Canadian Labour Economics Forum (CLEF), University of Waterloo.
    5. Rob Bauer & Inka Eberhardt & Paul Smeets, 2022. "A Fistful of Dollars: Financial Incentives, Peer Information, and Retirement Savings," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 35(6), pages 2981-3020.
    6. Sarah Dolfin & Nan Maxwell & Alix Gould-Werth & Armando Yañez & Jonah Deutsch & Libby Hendrix, "undated". "Compliance Strategies Evaluation Literature and Database Review," Mathematica Policy Research Reports 92ddb450d98b4b128f4fd1442, Mathematica Policy Research.
    7. Werner, Peter & Riedl, Arno, 2018. "The role of experiments for policy design," Research Memorandum 022, Maastricht University, Graduate School of Business and Economics (GSBE).
    8. Chlond, Bettina & Goeschl, Timo & Kesternich, Martin & Werthschulte, Madeline, 2024. "Transporting behavioral insights to low-income households: A field experiment on energy efficiency investments," Working Papers 0755, University of Heidelberg, Department of Economics.
    9. Lucas C. Coffman & Clayton R. Featherstone & Judd B. Kessler, 2017. "Can Social Information Affect What Job You Choose and Keep?," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(1), pages 96-117, January.
    10. Schächtele, Simeon & Eguino, Huáscar & Roman, Soraya, 2022. "Improving taxpayer registration through nudging? Field experimental evidence from Brazil," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    11. Silvia Saccardo & Hengchen Dai & Maria A. Han & Sitaram Vangala & Juyea Hoo & Jeffrey Fujimoto, 2024. "Field testing the transferability of behavioural science knowledge on promoting vaccinations," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 8(5), pages 878-890, May.
    12. Gabriele Ruiu & Giovanna Gonano, 2020. "Religious Barriers to the Diffusion of Same-sex Civil Unions in Italy," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 39(6), pages 1185-1203, December.
    13. Wright, Austin L. & Sonin, Konstantin & Driscoll, Jesse & Wilson, Jarnickae, 2020. "Poverty and economic dislocation reduce compliance with COVID-19 shelter-in-place protocols," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 180(C), pages 544-554.
    14. Guido de Blasio & Daniela Vuri, 2019. "Effects of the Joint Custody Law in Italy," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 16(3), pages 479-514, September.
    15. Graves Jennifer & McMullen Steven & Rouse Kathryn, 2018. "Teacher Turnover, Composition and Qualifications in the Year-Round School Setting," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 18(3), pages 1-27, July.
    16. Alston Lee J. & Mueller Bernardo, 2018. "Priests, Conflicts and Property Rights: the Impacts on Tenancy and Land Use in Brazil," Man and the Economy, De Gruyter, vol. 5(1), pages 1-26, June.
    17. S Anukriti & Catalina Herrera‐Almanza & Praveen K. Pathak & Mahesh Karra, 2020. "Curse of the Mummy‐ji: The Influence of Mothers‐in‐Law on Women in India†," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 102(5), pages 1328-1351, October.
    18. Ellison, Richard B. & Ellison, Adrian B. & Greaves, Stephen P. & Sampaio, Breno, 2017. "Electronic ticketing systems as a mechanism for travel behaviour change? Evidence from Sydney’s Opal card," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 80-93.
    19. Cruzatti C., John & Bjørnskov, Christian & Sáenz de Viteri, Andrea & Cruzatti, Christian, 2024. "Geography, development, and power: Parliament leaders and local clientelism," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 182(C).
    20. Puklavec, Žiga & Kogler, Christoph & Stavrova, Olga & Zeelenberg, Marcel, 2023. "What we tweet about when we tweet about taxes: A topic modelling approach," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 212(C), pages 1242-1254.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • H24 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Personal Income and Other Nonbusiness Taxes and Subsidies
    • H71 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue
    • H77 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - Intergovernmental Relations; Federalism
    • C93 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Field Experiments

    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:sae:pubfin:v:53:y:2025:i:4:p:415-439. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    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.