The Effect of Information Sharing on Tax-to-GDP Ratio

Abstract

In real world, taxpayers have private information of which tax agencies are either completely or partly not aware of. This issue gives rise to the so-called asymmetric information problem, seriously preventing tax laws from being justly and efficiently enforced. Asymmetry of information motivates taxpayer towards falsifying or concealing information, trying to enjoy benefits of failure to pay taxes (moral hazard); furthermore, by granting licenses to bad economic operators for operating as authorized economic operators, law-abiding companies may leave licensed and authorized market (adverse selection). It is obvious that, information sharing and availability of databases containing taxpayers’ information can help governments in recognizing and collecting taxes in a justly and fair manner. In this paper, using statistics from 92 countries during 2006 – 2012 (in the form of panel data), we have studied the effects of information sharing variables on tax-to-GDP ratio. The findings indicate that, information sharing has a positive, yet statistically insignificant, effect on the ratio, which is in agreement with theoretical foundations.

Keywords

• information sharing
• asymmetric information
• moral hazard
• adverse selection
• tax-to-gdp ratio