A Tax Evasion Model with Allowance for Retroactive Penalties*

Discrete models of tax evasion are considered when evasion has occurred over a period of several years. Allowance is made for growth in income, investment of illicit gains from successful evasion, and the imposition of retroactive penalties. Retroactive penalties increase deterrence of evasion if introduced at a point where evasion has been continuing for some years, since the utility gain from continuing successful evasion is unaffected, whereas the utility loss will be increased regardless of attitude to risk. Prohibitive penalty rates are determined, and a range of penalty rates are given in which some dishonest taxpayers may become honest. The formulation of the basic model and consequent conclusions are relevant to the current Australian taxation scene.     

Dynamic Tax Evasion with Habit Formation in Consumption*

We model the optimal intertemporal decision of an agent who chooses tax evasion and consumption, over an infinite lifetime horizon, where consumption is driven by habits. We find the following: (i) tax evaders reduce consumption in the early stages of habit accumulation and increase it over time; (ii) habit formation has a dampening effect on tax evasion; (iii) neglecting tax evasion can lead to habit overestimation; (iv) the effect of the tax rate on tax evasion is ambiguous; (v) heavy fines are more efficient than frequent controls in reducing tax evasion.     

Tax Evasion,Corruption and Tax Loopholes

This paper addresses tax loopholes that allow firms to exploit borderline cases between legal tax avoidance and illegal tax evasion. In general, tax loopholes are detrimental to a revenue‐maximizing government. This may change in the presence of corruption in the tax administration. Tax loopholes may serve as a separating mechanism that helps governments maximize revenues and curb corruption, which may explain why developing countries only gradually close loopholes in their tax codes.     

Trading Off Tax Distortion and Tax Evasion

Income tax evasion is modeled as a risky activity and integrated into a standard optimal tax problem in which there is a good whose sales are observable. If the penalty for evasion is proportional to the tax evaded (the Yitzhaki scheme), the optimal tax structure is unaffected by evasion. If the penalty is proportional to unreported income (the Allingham–Sandmo scheme), it is efficient to tax both the observable good and income. The cost of the risk of tax evasion is traded off against the distortion from taxing the observable good. For equal penalties, Allingham/Sandmo is more efficient than Yitzhaki.     

Tax Evasion and Limited Liability

Andreoni, Erard, and Feinstein (1998) suggest that imposing very high penalties for tax evasion is not possible under bankruptcy or limited liability constraints. In this paper, we complement their suggestion by showing that, in the presence of these constraints, imposing very high penalties can make an economy Pareto worse‐off. This result helps provide a further insight into why governments typically do not set very high penalties for tax evasion in practice. Implications for optimal deterrence policies in the context of tax evasion are also explored.     

逃税的经济学分析

本文运用对伊兹哈基模型的推导,把分析建立在如何缩小申报收入同真实收入的差距上,指出了对逃税水平变化有重要意义的四个变量:所得水平、税率、发现的概率和罚款率。在社会经济中建立一种能促进所得水平显性化机制,比较容易查出逃税行为。逃税对整个经济具有三方面影响。     

我国逃税行为的经济学分析

逃税作为一种信息不对称状态下的机会主义行为,在各个国家普遍存在。在转轨经济背景下,我国逃税现象更为严重,它给我们的资源配置及收入分配均带来负面影响。本文在介绍评价A-S经典模型的基础上,结合我国国情,从逃税心理成本的角度拓展了A-S模型的内容,从而更好地解释了我国的逃税现象并据此提出治理逃税行为的政策建议。     

Itemised Deductions: A Device to Reduce Tax Evasion

With direct incentives and sanctions being the most common instruments to fight tax evasion, the theoretical literature has tended to overlook indirect schemes, such as itemised deductions, in which one agent's behaviour affects the likelihood that others will declare their revenue. Itemised deductions provide an incentive for consumers to declare their purchases. This induces a partial shift in the demand from the black market to the legal one, for consumers need a transaction receipt to enjoy the tax deduction. I show that it is possible to increase tax proceeds by choosing a suitable level of itemised deduction, and this, for any level of taxation. Indeed, the cost for the tax authority on the consumers' side is more than compensated for by the extra proceeds generated on the sellers' side.     

Tax Overpayments, Tax Evasion, and Book-Tax Differences

A strictly risk-averse manager makes joint decisions on a firm's tax payments and book profit declarations according to accounting standards. It is analyzed how the incentives to overpay or evade taxes and to inflate book profits are influenced by (1) the composition of the manager's remuneration, (2) the ability to control the manager's actions, (3) the costs of making untruthful profit declarations, and (4) the tax rate. If the firm's owner or the government take into account these effects when pursuing their own objectives, the changes in tax payments and book profit declarations become theoretically more ambiguous.     

税收流失中的双委托-多代理问题

本文首次给出了税收流失问题中的多委托—多代理模型分析框架,并将政府、国税局和地税局、纳税人置于统一的博弈框架下,作为博弈的三方进行讨论。只要政府给国税局和地税局以适当的激励,政府仍然能设计出让纳税人"诚实"申报的显示机制;国税局和地税局作为税收征管者和纳税人之间的博弈可以看成是一个双委托—代理问题,此时税收征收上的"正外部性"和税收监菅上的"搭便车"效应将是双委托—代理问题中的新现象。     

个人所得税逃税理论模型的演进及对我国的启示

个人所得税的逃税问题是我国当前税收征管的一大难题。纳税人的逃税决策受到税率、未申报所得或未纳税额、查处概率、罚款力度、以及纳税人的风险厌恶程度和税收隐瞒技术等因素的影响。早期的个人所得税逃税模型主要着重于纳税人与政府强制征税能力的博弈分析，最近的文献则主要对包括税收隐瞒技术在内的更一般的模型进行了分析。本文的目的在于综合述评西方个人所得税逃税理论模型的演进和最新发展，并籍此提出该理论在中国的应用。     

Global Capital Tax as a Tool to Reduce Tax Evasion

International Advances in Economic Research -     

Tax Liability and Tax Evasion in a Competitive Labor Market

In a competitive labor market, a change in the legal incidence of a tax on labor will not alter employment if tax obligations are fulfilled. However, this irrelevance result may no longer apply if taxes can be evaded. In particular, a shift from payroll to income taxes will lower employment. This will be the case if workers exhibit constant absolute risk aversion, have a utility function, which is strongly separable in income and the disutility from working, and the penalty for evasion is not proportional to the amount of taxes evaded. Accordingly, tax evasion opportunities can make the legal incidence of a tax on labor an important determinant of its economic incidence.     

Tax Evasion,Corruption and Market Entry

We analyze the impact of tax policy on the market entry of firms in the presence of corruption and tax evasion. In a world with corruption, firms must bribe corrupt officials to enter the market. For a given level of bribes, higher tax rates and stricter enforcement of taxation decrease tax evasion but typically reduce market entry. However, when the level of bribes reacts to tax policy, higher taxes and stricter enforcement of taxation can have a double benefit. Up to a certain threshold, for which we develop a simple rule, stricter enforcement increases market entry and reduces tax evasion.     

The International Transmission of Tax Policies In A Dynamic World Economy*

The international transmission of tax shocks are analyzed in a two-country infinite-horizon representative agent framework. the viability of the tax regimes, arising from the arbitrage conditions characterizing equilibrium in a perfect world capital market, is emphasized. Conditions for both short-run and long-run viability are derived, and the two polar regimes of source-based and residence-based taxation are discussed. In general, the former is found more likely to satisfy the viability conditions than the latter. With equity financing, the long-run viability of residence-based taxation is likely to require the harmonization of tax and/or dividend policy. the main features of the dynamic adjustment paths following a tax increase are characterized.     

Evasion Effects of Changing the Tax Mix*

This study assesses claims that shifting toward greater indirect taxes will reduce evasion, thereby improving the distribution of real net incomes and generating a 'fiscal dividend'. Practical considerations suggest that industry sectors which evade income taxes will also be strongly inclined to evade indirect taxes on their output. A general equilibrium analysis finds that changing the tax mix will have little or none of the claimed anti–evasion or distributional effects. Increased indirect taxes on evaders' consumption purchases will be shifted onto suppliers in the compliant sector. Evaders will end up evading less income taxes but evading more indirect taxes     

Estimates of Cash-Based Income Tax Evasion in Australia

This article provides new estimates of the size of the cash economy in Australia over the period from 1950–51 to 1989–90. This series is used to estimate income tax revenue losses for each year and to examine the factors which influence the incentive to evade income tax.     

Tax Evasion and the Time Consistency of the Government's Income Tax Policy

It is shown that it is not necessarily optimal for the government to tax capital income at a high rate even when capital is in fixed supply because the supply of capital for tax purposes may be elastic if capital income tax evasion occurs. An example is given where the wage tax rate is positive and greater than the interest income tax rate even though capital is in fixed supply. Conditions are also derived under which the capital income tax rate is lower in the closed-loop policy game, where capital is fixed, than in the open-loop game, where it is not.
JEL Classification Numbers: E61, H26.     

Income Tax Evasion in a Unionised Labour Market

Labour market outcomes can depend on tax evasion since the returns from working are affected by the amount of taxes paid. In this paper, unionised workers are assumed to select the income which they declare. The rational trade union takes this decision into account. It is shown that the employment effects of a linear income tax are not altered qualitatively by tax evasion if the fine for evasion is a function only of the evaded tax. Moreover, the consequences of changes in the tax enforcement system are determined by the ability to choose evasion activities optimally. The existence of unrestricted tax evasion opportunities lowers wages.