The Impact of Voting on Tax Payments
通过两个实验发现，允许纳税人投票决定税款用途能提高其合作意愿和纳税额，且程序公平感和对政府的信任在其中起中介作用。
It is hypothesized that allowing taxpayers to participate in governmental decisions on the use of tax money would increase their cooperation and willingness to pay the tax due. In experiment 1 (N = 97), participants voted between different rules for a public good game and cooperated with their group by contributing to the group account. Cooperation in experiment 2 (N = 119) was defined as the participants' tax payments. The participants were allowed to vote on the use of their tax money. Additionally to the voting manipulation, the participants learned that either they themselves or others would benefit from tax-financed projects. The results from both experiments suggest that voting, i.e., participation, increases cooperation. Whether participants benefited themselves from tax-financed projects or whether others benefited from the projects did matter for participants' tax compliance. Furthermore, the results indicate that more procedural fairness was perceived when allowing for voting and that participants' trust in the governmental system mediates the relation of procedural fairness and tax payments.