Asset ambiguity, reporting flexibility, and strategic declarations: Evidence from audit announcements and a dividend tax cut
利用荷兰行政数据，研究资产分类模糊性和税务报告灵活性如何使纳税人策略性申报，发现审计公告后富人申报财产相关资产激增，且股东利用股息税削减进行收入转移。
This paper studies how ambiguity in asset classification and flexibility in tax reporting enable strategic tax declarations. Using administrative data from the Netherlands, we show that a 2005 audit announcement coincided with sharp increases in declared property-related assets, particularly among the wealthiest taxpayers, in sections not directly targeted by the announcement. The study also exploits a one-year dividend tax cut in 2007, which coincided with a second audit announcement, to further examine strategic spontaneous declarations and income shifting among shareholders, particularly those with substantial company holdings. The findings reveal how taxpayers exploit reporting flexibility to declare previously hidden and hard-to-trace wealth. The results underscore how classification ambiguity can be used to strategically reallocate wealth in response to tax policy changes.