Tax Enforcement

Taxes are the major source of revenue for a state to finance its activities. As citizens and companies do not always pay their taxes voluntarily, taxes need to be enforced. Finding ways to measure the impact of tax enforcement instruments is an empirical challenge for researchers: In particular, there is a lack of data that allows to describe the degree of tax honesty of a company or an individual. After all, tax evasion only becomes possible by hiding the crucial information–for example true income and true wealth–from the tax authorities and the public.

We use innovative research designs and field experiments, often in cooperation with tax authorities, to identify causal effects of tax enforcement.