Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/182441 
Year of Publication: 
2018
Series/Report no.: 
Hohenheim Discussion Papers in Business, Economics and Social Sciences No. 21-2018
Publisher: 
Universität Hohenheim, Fakultät Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften, Stuttgart
Abstract: 
Can public shaming increase tax compliance through social pressure? Many tax authorities make ample use of public shaming. However, empirical evidence from outside the laboratory on how a new shaming law affects overall compliance is lacking. We provide the first evidence from the field, exploiting comprehensive administrative tax data and the introduction of a novel naming-and-shaming policy in Slovenia in 2012. The policy aims to reduce outstanding tax debt among the self-employed and corporations. Our empirical strategy exploits the variation across taxpayers in ex ante exposure to the shaming policy. We find that taxpayers reduce their tax debt by 8.5% to avoid shaming, particularly in industries where reputational concerns are likely to be important. The publication of the first naming-and-shaming list further reduces tax debt among shamed taxpayers because of social learning. This effect, however, is marginal in terms of revenue and tapers off quickly.
Subjects: 
compliance
tax debt
shaming
enforcement
social image concerns
penalty
JEL: 
H26
D1
K34
K42
Z13
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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