Tax Policy and Tax Administration in Russia: The Case of the Banking Sector

The 'informal' sector of an economy is generally seen as a private sphere, where agents seek to escape the reach of the state and, in particular, the tax organs. However, given the weakness of the Russian state and the enormous scale of informal economic activity, the fiscal authorities try to cope, at least in part, by adopting informal strategies of their own. This paper aims to deepen our understanding of how this informal fiscal system actually works. While the analysis here focuses on the banking system, its implications for tax and accounting reform extend far beyond the banking sector.