Public Goods, Hidden Income, and Tax Evasion: Some Nonstandard Results from the Warm-Glow Model / Daniel M. Hungerman.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Hungerman, Daniel M.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w19804.

NBER working paper series no. w19804

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Other Title:

Public Goods, Hidden Income, and Tax Evasion

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2014.

Summary:

A large literature explores crowd out in situations where public goods are jointly provided; work in this area typically depicts a tax system where individuals take taxes as given. But in some settings, such as those in developing economies, efforts to evade or avoid taxes may be widespread. Using the canonical warm-glow model, this paper considers joint pubic-good provision in a setting where individuals can evade taxes by hiding their income. The model's implications change significantly in this setting: with hidden income, stronger warm glow will lead to greater crowd out, not less. Using research on crowd out and inter-family transfers, I present suggestive evidence that the model's results may help to reconcile divergent estimates of crowd out in the literature.

Notes:

Print version record

January 2014.