Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Preface
- Contents
- List of Authors
- Introduction
- PART I TAXATION, STATE AND SOCIETY: RECIPROCITY AND THE LIMITS OF THE POWER TO TAX
- Voluntary Compliance Beyond the Letter of the Law: Reciprocity and Fair Play
- What is Wrong with Endowment Taxation: Self-Usership as a Prerequisite for Legitimate Taxation
- Is Taxation on a Par with Forced Labour?
- Conflict of Trust: EU Member States’ Fiscal Sovereignty and the Ideal of the Internal Market
- PART II Trust and morality: tax governance in need of transparency
- PART III International taxation: in search of democratic legitimacy
- PART IV Behavioural aspects of taxation and trust
Voluntary Compliance Beyond the Letter of the Law: Reciprocity and Fair Play
from PART I - TAXATION, STATE AND SOCIETY: RECIPROCITY AND THE LIMITS OF THE POWER TO TAX
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 September 2018
- Frontmatter
- Preface
- Contents
- List of Authors
- Introduction
- PART I TAXATION, STATE AND SOCIETY: RECIPROCITY AND THE LIMITS OF THE POWER TO TAX
- Voluntary Compliance Beyond the Letter of the Law: Reciprocity and Fair Play
- What is Wrong with Endowment Taxation: Self-Usership as a Prerequisite for Legitimate Taxation
- Is Taxation on a Par with Forced Labour?
- Conflict of Trust: EU Member States’ Fiscal Sovereignty and the Ideal of the Internal Market
- PART II Trust and morality: tax governance in need of transparency
- PART III International taxation: in search of democratic legitimacy
- PART IV Behavioural aspects of taxation and trust
Summary
ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the obligation to pay taxes. It starts from the idea of voluntary taxation. In ancient Athens, the wealthy had a moral obligation to pay a periodic voluntary contribution (‘ liturgy ‘). They paid for religious festivals and military expeditions which benefited society. This progressive voluntary tax was seen as a prerequisite for democracy, and so for equal political participation. Moreover, redistributive taxation thus mitigated substantial economic inequality. Nonetheless, there were ‘ free-riders ‘ who undermined citizens ‘ trust and their willingness to pay. The lesson to be learned is that the moral (political) obligation to pay taxes needs to be laid down in the law in order to create reciprocal trust that all citizens pay their (fair) share. This does not, however, preclude free-riding, for wealthy taxpayers and multinational corporations are often able to deftly play the (international) tax rules. Here the principle of reciprocity comes in. The principle of reciprocity underlies the obligation to obey the law and engenders a duty of fair play with regard to the obligation to pay taxes. It is argued that compliance should not be reduced to minimalist rule-following, minimising one ‘ s tax liability. This can be seen as taxpayers voluntarily complying beyond the strict letter of the law.
INTRODUCTION
The German philosopher Peter Sloterdijk recently labelled taxation ‘ the central moral phenomenon of our civilisation.’ He proposed an experiment: citizens should be allowed to pay (part of) their taxes voluntarily and to decide on the way this voluntary contribution should be spent. He argues that voluntarily paying taxes would contribute to citizens ‘ trust in politics and the way government spends their money.
In classical Athens rich citizens were expected to pay taxes voluntarily in kind. However, too many of these citizens refused to contribute which forced Athens to introduce obligatory payments. Historical evidence thus shows that a moral (political) obligation to pay taxes needs to be laid down in the law in order to create reciprocal trust that all citizens will pay their (fair) share.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Building Trust in Taxation , pp. 17 - 50Publisher: IntersentiaPrint publication year: 2017
- 4
- Cited by