Harnessing Deductions to Increase Tax Compliance and Formalization
评估厄瓜多尔一项税收改革，该改革引入个人所得税扣除以鼓励消费者索要发票，从而促使小型自雇企业报告更多利润，并产生增值税溢出效应，净收入分析显示增加的税收超过损失的税收。
We evaluate a tax reform in Ecuador that introduced generous deductions from personal income taxes (PIT), encouraging consumers to request receipts. The reform addresses tax evasion by targeting small self-employed businesses that mainly sell goods or services not subject to value-added taxes (VAT) but that often evade income taxes. Exploiting plausibly exogenous variation in receipt demand due to the distribution of taxpayers across regions and professions, we find significant increases in reported profits among self-employed businesses exposed to the reform. We document spillover effects on VAT. Our net-revenue impact analysis suggests the additional tax payments outweigh the foregone tax revenue.