IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/27571.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Understanding the Revenue Potential of Tax Compliance Investment

Author

Listed:
  • Natasha Sarin
  • Lawrence H. Summers

Abstract

In a July 2020 report, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that modest investments in the IRS would generate somewhere between $60 and $100 billion in additional revenue over a decade. This is qualitatively correct. But quantitatively, the revenue potential is much more significant than the CBO report suggests. We highlight five reasons for the CBO’s underestimation: 1) the scale of the investment in the IRS contemplated is modest and far short of sufficient even to return the IRS budget to 2011 levels; 2) the CBO contemplates a limited range of interventions, excluding entirely progress on information reporting and technological advancements; 3) the estimates assume rapidly diminishing returns to marginal increases in investment; 4) the estimates leave out the effect of increased enforcement on taxpayer decision-making; and 5) the use of the 10-year window means that the long-run benefits of increased enforcement are excluded. We discuss these issues, present an alternative calculation, and conclude that a commitment to restoring tax compliance efforts to historical levels could generate over $1 trillion in the next decade.

Suggested Citation

  • Natasha Sarin & Lawrence H. Summers, 2020. "Understanding the Revenue Potential of Tax Compliance Investment," NBER Working Papers 27571, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:27571
    Note: PE
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w27571.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Slemrod, Joel & Blumenthal, Marsha & Christian, Charles, 2001. "Taxpayer response to an increased probability of audit: evidence from a controlled experiment in Minnesota," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(3), pages 455-483, March.
    2. Jason DeBacker & Bradley T. Heim & Anh Tran & Alexander Yuskavage, 2018. "Once Bitten, Twice Shy? The Lasting Impact of Enforcement on Tax Compliance," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 61(1), pages 1-35.
    3. Congressional Budget Office, 2020. "Trends in the Internal Revenue Service’s Funding and Enforcement," Reports 56422, Congressional Budget Office.
    4. Congressional Budget Office, 2018. "Options for Reducing the Deficit: 2019 to 2028," Reports 54667, Congressional Budget Office.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Knut Løyland & Oddbjørn Raaum & Gaute Torsvik & Arnstein Øvrum, 2024. "Evaluating compliance gains of expanding tax enforcement," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 91(361), pages 142-162, January.
    2. John Guyton & Patrick Langetieg & Daniel Reck & Max Risch & Gabriel Zucman, 2021. "Tax Evasion at the Top of the Income Distribution: Theory and Evidence," NBER Working Papers 28542, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    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. Arun Advani, 2022. "Who does and doesn't pay taxes?," Fiscal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 43(1), pages 5-22, March.
    2. Dina Pomeranz & José Vila-Belda, 2019. "Taking State-Capacity Research to the Field: Insights from Collaborations with Tax Authorities," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 11(1), pages 755-781, August.
    3. Konda, Laura & Patel, Elena & Seegert, Nathan, 2022. "Tax enforcement and the intended and unintended consequences of information disclosure," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 212(C).
    4. Alex Raskolnikov, 2020. "Criminal Deterrence: A Review of the Missing Literature," Supreme Court Economic Review, University of Chicago Press, vol. 28(1), pages 1-59.
    5. Hebous, Shafik & Jia, Zhiyang & Løyland, Knut & Thoresen, Thor O. & Øvrum, Arnstein, 2023. "Do Audits Improve Future Tax Compliance in the Absence of Penalties? Evidence from Random Audits in Norway," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 207(C), pages 305-326.
    6. Eberhartinger, Eva & Safaei, Reyhaneh & Sureth, Caren & Wu, Yuchen, 2021. "Are risk-based tax audit stretegies rewarded? An analysis of corporate tax avoidance," arqus Discussion Papers in Quantitative Tax Research 267, arqus - Arbeitskreis Quantitative Steuerlehre.
    7. Christiansen, Tobias Gabel, 2024. "Dynamic effects of tax audits and the role of intentions," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 234(C).
    8. Torgler, Benno & Schneider, Friedrich & Schaltegger, Christoph A., 2007. "With or Against the People? The Impact of a Bottom-Up Approach on Tax Morale and the Shadow Economy," Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics, Working Paper Series qt6331x6vz, Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics.
    9. Lars P. Feld & Benno Torgler, 2007. "Tax Morale after the Reunification of Germany: Results from a Quasi-Natural Experiment," CREMA Working Paper Series 2007-03, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    10. Matthias Kasper & James Alm, 2022. "Does the Bomb-crater Effect Really Exist? Evidence from the Laboratory," FinanzArchiv: Public Finance Analysis, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 78(1-2), pages 87-111.
    11. Almeida, Sergio, 2023. "Punishment credibility and cooperation in public good games," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 106(C).
    12. Dossè Mawussi Djahini‐Afawoubo, 2024. "Understanding tax payment behaviour in the West African Economic and Monetary Union: The role of perceived detection capacity and honesty," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(2), pages 795-823, March.
    13. Kazuki Onji, 2009. "A tale of pork prices : evasion and attenuation of a Japanese tariff," Trade Working Papers 22883, East Asian Bureau of Economic Research.
    14. De Simone, Lisa & Klassen, Kenneth J. & Seidman, Jeri K., 2022. "The effect of income-shifting aggressiveness on corporate investment," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(1).
    15. Faeyz M. J. Abuamria, 2019. "The Effect of Deterrence Factors on Discourage Shadow Economy Level and Tax Evasion," International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, Human Resource Management Academic Research Society, International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, vol. 9(1), pages 65-70, January.
    16. Gemmell, Norman & Hasseldine, John, 2012. "The Tax Gap: A Methodological Review," Working Paper Series 18717, Victoria University of Wellington, Chair in Public Finance.
    17. Musharraf Rasool Cyan & Antonios M. Koumpias & Jorge Martinez-Vazquez, 2016. "The Effects of Media Campaigns on Individual Attitudes towards Tax Compliance; Quasi-experimental Evidence from Survey Data in Pakistan," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper1609, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    18. Cãƒtãƒlina Cozmei, 2012. "Playing The Fiscal Lottery Game," Proceedings of the INTERNATIONAL MANAGEMENT CONFERENCE, Faculty of Management, Academy of Economic Studies, Bucharest, Romania, vol. 6(1), pages 511-521, November.
    19. Bruce, Donald & Gurley-Calvez, Tami J. & Norwood, Alex, 2020. "Entrepreneurship as Trust," Foundations and Trends(R) in Entrepreneurship, now publishers, vol. 16(5), pages 393-443, April.
    20. Cécile Bazart & Michael Pickhardt, 2009. "Fighting Income Tax Evasion with Positive Rewards: Experimental Evidence," Working Papers 09-01, LAMETA, Universtiy of Montpellier, revised Jun 2009.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • H0 - Public Economics - - General
    • H2 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue
    • H22 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Incidence

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:nbr:nberwo:27571. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    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.