In July 2013 the OECD, to tackle multinational tax avoidance, published its Action Plan against base erosion and profit shifting. The Action Plan suggests a variety of legislative and administrative measures to eliminate frictions from interactions between domestic tax laws and international tax treaties, including potential double non-taxation of businesses operating in several countries. By virtue of the OECD's structure, the proposed measures have been designed and developed predominantly by representatives from the tax administrations of OECD member countries. Our research investigates the views and opinions of other stakeholders in this process, namely tax experts from practice. We conduct a conjoint analysis, surveying experts in international taxation regarding their perceptions and beliefs on the effectiveness of the proposed actions. We find that experts rank actions that are aimed at enhancing international coordination and cooperation, as well as actions that reduce legal uncertainty, higher than other actions. Of lesser importance are antitreaty-abuse measures, further transparency at the taxpayer level and amendments to the definition of permanent establishment. (authors' abstract) / Series: WU International Taxation Research Paper Series

This paper presents new empirical evidence on the determinants of corruption, focussing on the role of globalization and inequality. The estimates for a panel of 102 countries over the period 1995-2005 point to three main results: i) Detection technologies, reflected in a high level of development, human capital, and political rights reduce corruption, whereas natural resource rents increase corruption. ii) Globalization (in terms of both trade and financial openness) has a negative effect on corruption, which is more pronounced in developing countries. iii) Inequality increases corruption, and once the role of inequality is accounted for, the impact of globalization on corruption is halved. In line with recent theory, this suggests that globalization - besides reducing corruption through enhanced competition - affects corruption also by reducing inequality. / Series: Department of Economics Working Paper Series

In dieser schattenwirtschaftlichen Kausalanalyse wurden entsprechend der Thematik aus der Sicht des Autors relevante Ursachen für eine expandierende Schattenökonomie in Russland vertiefend untersucht. Ein entscheidender Faktor bei der Begünstigung der Second Economy kann darin gesehen werden, dass es dem Staat im bisherigen Verlauf der Transformation nicht ausreichend gelang seine Rolle als Garant für die Schaffung und Einhaltung von festen Regeln einerseits sowie einen weitergehenden Rückzug aus unmittelbar wirtschaftlichen Abläufen andererseits in wünschenswertem maße zu realisieren. Mit den Zugängen sollte in einer fundierten Ursachenanalyse mehr Licht in das Dunkel expandierender schattenwirtschaftlicher, korrupter Erscheinungen fallen und dabei kausale Verknüpfungen zwischen den Zugängen ersichtlich werden. Der Zusammenhang zwischen Rahmenbedingungen, Motivation und der Entscheidungsbildung von Wirtschaftssubjekten wurde anhand 3 theoretischer Ansätze näher analysiert. Die aus den statistischen Schätzungen ersichtliche weit verbreitete Suche nach „unsozialen“ Vorteilen kann auch als eine Orientierungslosigkeit bezüglich der Akzeptanz gesetzlicher Regeln des gesellschaftlichenZusammenlebens durch die russische Bevölkerung angesehen werden. Ein Umdenken würde voraussetzen, dass die Gesetzgebung einer ständigen Begutachtung durch gewählte demokratische Gremien unterliegt und die Menschen weniger gegängelt, bevormundet werden wie in sowjetischer Periode. Viele der Vorschläge zur Reduzierung der russischen Schattenwirtschaft stellen ein Kurieren an Symptomen dar und sind auch als Reflex auf bestimmte Interessenpositionen anzusehen. Die Untersuchung zeigt, wohin eine Wirtschaft steuern kann, wenn sie nicht die erforderlichen Rahmenbedingungen erhält, die juristischen Gesetzesgrundlagen aus den genannten Gründen heraus zunehmend missachtet werden (eigene, ungeschriebene Regeln dafür gelten) sowie das Sozialsystem nicht bzw. nicht mehr erforderliche Mindestsicherheiten bieten kann. Deshalb erscheint es notwendig, die schattenökonomischen Vorgänge Russlands nicht als „fremde Phänomene“ eines „weit entfernten“ Landes zu betrachten. Vielmehr muss bei realistischer Betrachtung der Tatsache ins Auge gesehen werden, dass diese „russische Problematik“ einer expandierenden Second Economy außerhalb von Gesetz und Statistik in Deutschland und anderen westlichen Staaten nicht diese Dimension annahm. Mit zunehmender Wirtschaftskrise wird auch in der Bundesrepublik die Schattenökonomie als eine Antwort auf ungelöste Schwierigkeiten in der Wirtschafts-, Arbeitsmarkt- und Sozialpolitik zu einem Problemfaktor heranwachsen, dem zukünftig mehr Aufmerksamkeit gewidmet werden sollte. / In this causal analysis of the shadow (black) economy, the relevant reasons for the expanding shadow economy in Russia have been looked into from the author’s point of view and in accordance with the topic. A crucial factor in favouring the Second Economy can be seen in the fact that during the previous course of the transformation the state hadn''t succeeded in realizing its part as a guarantor of the creation and observance of the solid rules on the one hand, and as a guarantor of the largely reduction of the regulated economic relations to an acceptable extent on the other hand. Examining the aspects in this causal form should help to cast more light into the shadows of the expanding black economy and its corruptive forms making the causal connections between them more obvious. The connection between the basic conditions, the motivation and the way of decision forming by the economists was thoroughly analyzed on the basis of three theoretical points. The widely spread search for the “unsocial” advantages, which is obvious from the statistical estimations, can be considered also as the lack of direction (Orientierungslosigkeit) in regard to the acceptance of the lawful rules in social live by the Russians. Rethinking would presuppose that the legislation should be subject to the regular examination through the chosen democratic committees and the people not be kept tied and patronized, like in the Soviet period. Many of the suggestions on the reduction of the Russian shadow-economy suppose the cure of the obvious symptoms and are to be regarded also as a reflex on the certain positions of interest. The above study gives the insight into such aspects as: where the national economy can steer 1) if it has no basic conditions; 2). if the fundamental legal principles by the mentioned reasons are increasingly disregarded but some unwritten rules are accepted; 3). if the social system can not offer the necessary minimum security any longer. Therefore, it appears to be necessary not to consider the shade-economic processes of Russia as the foreign phenomena of a "far distant " country. More than that, one must contemplate the fact that this "Russian problematic system" of the expanding Second Economy outside the law and statistics couldn’t reach such enormous dimensions in Germany and other Western states. In the conditions of the growing economic crisis the shadow-economy would certainly become a problem factor also in the Federal Republic of Germany being a reaction on unsolved difficulties in its economic, labour market and social policy. More attention should be dedicated to this problem in future.

The present study addresses the question of how taxpayers' perceptions of government and tax authorities are influenced by media coverage. The effect that national political topics, such as tax legislation and the expenditure of tax revenues, have on the tax payer is examined. Tax compliance depends on trust in authorities, i.e., a commonly shared belief that politicians and tax authorities act in order to promote social welfare, and the perceived power of authorities, i.e., taxpayers' perceptions of tax authorities' ability to detect and pursue tax crime. We investigate the influence of specific tax related information in the news on intended tax compliance. Results from a questionnaire-based experiment with 487 employees indicate that media coverage influences the indicated trust in tax authorities, as well as the perceived power of governmental institutions, and consequently, has an impact on participants' intended tax compliance. The findings suggest that governments should actively engage in the provision of relevant information on tax matters. This would increase both trust in the state and the authorities as well as awareness of their power regarding the enforcement of tax laws, effectively acting as a means to regulate taxpayers' behavior. (authors' abstract) / Series: WU International Taxation Research Paper Series

Diese Dissertation befasst sich in drei voneinander unabhängigen Kapiteln mit dem Forschungsfeld des ökonomischen Designs. Das "Design" von Situationen wirtschaftlicher Interaktion hat zum Ziel, den Verlauf und das Ergebnis der jeweiligen Interaktion zu steuern. In dieser Arbeit werden mathematisch-theoretische "Designs" zum einen formal entwickelt und diese zum anderen durch politische oder soziale Institutionen realisiert. Das erste Kapitel thematisiert die Implementierung von Sozialwahlfunktionen in einem kollusiven Umfeld. Es wird gezeigt, wie die gezielte Schaffung von asymmetrischer Information zwischen den kolludierenden Parteien deren Koordination erschweren und die Implementierung erleichtern kann. Im zweiten Kapitel wird dieser Ansatz im Kontext der Bestechlichkeit bei Finanzaudits angewendet. Korruption kann verhindert werden, wenn der bestechliche Akteure eine Warnung über anstehende Kontrollen erhält, nicht jedoch der bestechende Akteur. Das dritte Kapitel wiederum untersucht "Design" in Form von Markt- und Wettbewerbsregulierung. Eine Beschränkung des Wettbewerbs - durch eine Begrenzung der Zahl miteinander konkurrierender Firmen - kann entgegen der ökonomischen Intuition wohlfahrtsoptimierend sein. / This thesis contributes to the field of economic design in three independent chapters. Taking the perspective of a "designer", it derives formal solutions in the framework of economic theory and suggests political as well as social institutions to put these solutions to practice. The first chapter employs mechanism design to mitigate the problem of collusion. It shows how the implementation of social choice functions can be achieved by introducing asymmetric information into a system prone to collusion. In the second chapter, this methodology is applied to the context of corruption in auditing. Bribery is impeded by selectively warning one - and only one - of the corruptive parties about upcoming inspections. Finally, the third chapter studies market regulation as a means of "design". Contrary to economic intuition, it may be beneficial in terms of welfare to limit competition by restricting the number of firms allowed to enter a market.