The book will be of considerable assistance to students and other researchers working in the area of compliance behaviour, or more generally, in the area of designing empirical studies. Margaret McKerchar, The British Accounting Review Torgler s book is a valuable contribution to the tax field, especially as it pioneers research into tax morale that is in its infancy and helps redress the US domination of the tax-compliance literature. It places econometric analysis where it rightly belongs as the supporting act, not the main feature! and takes a holistic approach in attempting to explain the complex area of human behaviour that tax compliance involves, whatever the country. Jeff Pope, Agenda Benno Torgler has written an exciting and important book. His careful and imaginative use of survey and experimental data explores important behavioral and institutional dimensions of tax policy and administration that have been too long neglected. The book provides a thorough exposition of what we now know about these issues as well as a rich menu of suggestions about how to do empirical research on the relation between citizens and states and how to build social capital through rethinking how states tax their citizens. Richard M. Bird, University of Toronto, Canada The question of why citizens pay their taxes has attracted increased attention in the tax compliance literature of late. In this book, Benno Torgler considers the evidence that suggests that enforcement efforts cannot fully explain the high degree of tax compliance within society. To attempt to resolve this puzzle, numerous researchers have argued that citizens attitudes towards paying taxes (defined as tax morale) help to explain the high degree of compliance. Yet most have treated tax morale itself as a black box, failing to discuss the issues influencing it. This unique volume provides important new insights into the factors that shape the emergence and maintenance of citizens willingness to cooperate with tax legislations in different societies. Distinctive in its examination of citizen tax morale and tax compliance, this book will be of great interest to academics, researchers and students concerned with economics, political science, sociology, social psychology and accounting. It will also appeal to policymakers and practitioners.

Over the last several decades, there has been a growing interest in theoretical, empirical, and experimental work on all aspects of tax compliance and tax evasion. The essays in this volume summarize the existing state of knowledge of tax compliance and tax evasion, present new thinking about this issue, and analyze the empirical relevance of these new perspectives. The original essays in this volume represent an attempt to provide a framework on compliance that moves beyond the economics-of-crime perspective, one that provides a more complete understanding of individual (and group) decisions, and one that is more consistent with empirical evidence. It is the insights of behavioural economics that provide much of the bases for these essays and the main theme running through this book is that the basic model of individual choice must be expanded, by introducing some aspects of behaviour or motivation considered explicitly by other social sciences.

This volume provides a comprehensive analysis of why taxpayers behave the way they do. It reveals the motivations for why some taxpayers comply with the law while others choose not to comply. Given the current global financial climate there is a need for governments worldwide to increase their revenue collections via improving taxpayer compliance. Research into what shapes and influences taxpayer behavior is critical in that any marginal improvement in understanding and dealing with this behavior can potentially have a dramatic impact upon government revenue. Based on Australian data derived from the data bases of the Australian Taxation Office as an example, this book presents findings that provide lessons for tax systems around the world. Regardless of the type of tax system in place, taxpayers of all nationalities are concerned about how their tax authorities deal with non-compliance and in particular how the tax authorities go about encouraging compliance and ensuring a fair tax system for all. The book presents empirical evidence concerning taxpayer compliance behavior with particular attention being drawn to the moral values of taxpayers, the perceived fairness of the tax system and the deterrent measures undertaken by revenue authorities which influence that behavior. Other issues examined include the degree to which tax penalties operate as an effective deterrent to curbing behavior and how taxpayers' level of general tax knowledge and awareness also impacts upon their actions.​

How do you make taxpayers comply? This ethnography offers a vivid, yet nuanced account of knowledge making at one of Sweden’s most esteemed bureaucracies – the Swedish Tax Agency. In its aim to collect taxes and minimize tax faults, the Agency mediates the application of tax law to ensure compliance and maintain legitimacy in society. This volume follows one risk assessment project’s passage through the Agency, from its inception, through the research phase, in discussions with management to its final abandonment. With its fiscal anthropological approach, Shaping Taxpayers reveals how diverse knowledge claims – legal, economic, cultural – compete to shape taxpayer behaviour.

Not everyone complies with the United States Internal Revenue Code. Many individuals and organizations fail to file timely tax returns, assess their tax liability correctly, or pay taxes when due. To improve compliance, tax administrators must choose among alternative strategies, such as increasing evaders' risks of punishment, motivating social norms, and making compliance easier. Concerned with these choices, the IRS asked the National Academy to assess previous research on the determinants of taxpayer compliance and to highlight the most promising areas for future research. The Academy's panel authored the two-volume Taxpayer Compliance. Volume I presents the panel's report, which critically reviews previous research on the subject, reaches conclusions about the findings, and recommends future research programs to fill gaps in knowledge. The report also recommends ways to maintain and develop the intellectual, financial, and data resources devoted to taxpayer compliance research. Volume I presents the panel's report, which critically reviews previous research on the subject, reaches conclusions about the findings and recommends future research programs to fill gaps in knowledge. The report also recommends ways to maintain and develop the intellectual, financial, and data resources devoted to taxpayer compliance research. Taxpayer Compliance will be a valuable reference for tax practitioners and others concerned with noncompliance problems, and for scholars and students of law and sociology, political science, social psychology, and economics.

Experts discuss strategies for curtailing tax evasion

The Model Rules of Professional Conduct provides an up-to-date resource for information on legal ethics. Federal, state and local courts in all jurisdictions look to the Rules for guidance in solving lawyer malpractice cases, disciplinary actions, disqualification issues, sanctions questions and much more. In this volume, black-letter Rules of Professional Conduct are followed by numbered Comments that explain each Rule's purpose and provide suggestions for its practical application. The Rules will help you identify proper conduct in a variety of given situations, review those instances where discretionary action is possible, and define the nature of the relationship between you and your clients, colleagues and the courts.

Unlocking what drives tax morale – the intrinsic willingness to pay tax – can greatly assist governments in the design of tax policies and their administration, particularly in developing countries where compliance rates are low. This report builds on previous OECD research to identify some of the key socio-economic and institutional drivers of tax morale across developing countries, and seeks to test for evidence of the social contract by examining the impact of public services on tax morale. It also uses new data on tax certainty as an entry point to explore tax morale in businesses, where existing research is very limited. Finally, the report identifies a range of factors related to the tax system that may affect business decision making, how they vary across regions, and suggests some areas for future research. Overall, the report provides a range of suggestions for further work, and how tax morale considerations can be integrated into holistic tax compliance strategies.

Prominent among initiatives addressing the urgent need for a common understanding between multinational enterprises (MNEs) and national tax authorities about risks and risk assessment is the International Compliance Assurance Programme (ICAP), which provides a channel for MNEs to engage in simultaneous discussions with multiple national tax administrations, thus enhancing the potential for advance tax assurance. To a certain extent, the ICAP represents the internationalization of Co-operative Compliance frameworks which were, until then, restricted within the borders of single jurisdictions. This book is the first to investigate Co-operative Compliance alongside with the ICAP, describing developments in twelve countries (Australia, Austria, Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States). Following a general introduction, two opening perspectives on the ICAP are presented, one from the OECD and one from a participating tax administration (the Netherlands), leading to the twelve country reports and a special chapter on transfer pricing, which is the main issue in international tax disputes. Specific elements reviewed include the following: criteria to enter the programme; the range of taxes covered by the programme; real-time consultation procedures; appeal procedures within the programme; the possibility to ‘agree to disagree’ and to continue Co-operative Compliance even in cases of litigation; risk management strategies within tax authorities; corporate administrative compliance burden; and main sources of tax uncertainty. Country reports are contributed by tax professionals and tax academics experienced in dealing with Co-operative Compliance and the ICAP. Each report addresses the same questions, so that all the reports cover the same features of domestic relationship approaches and the ICAP. A final chapter reviews the collected contributions and offers some concluding remarks. Although the ICAP process probably will undergo further adjustments, it is certain that the road to more international cooperation between tax authorities and MNEs is now open. This timely book, as a comparative review of the implementation of the ICAP among leading jurisdictions active in global trade, provides matchless insights into trends, similarities, differences and their implications. It will be welcomed by all stakeholders in the international tax community, including lawyers, taxation authorities and academics.