What you pay is what you get? Public Social Spending and Tax Morale

Seminar paper from the year 2016 in the subject Psychology - Social Psychology, grade: 1,3, University of Potsdam (Chair for Political Science, Public Administration and Organization), course: Professional and Management Skills - Research Skills Module, language: English, abstract: In this short paper I will develop a conceptual proposal to explore the relationship between public social spending (PSS) and tax morale. The latter has experienced more and more interest among scholars in the past several decades in order to clarify the 'puzzle of tax compliance', which is to explain, why tax compliance turns out to be substantially higher than the neo-classical model would estimate. Since research has provided empirical evidence for the impact of tax morale on tax compliance, scientists are faced with the challenge to come up with determinants of tax morale. This paper suggests public social spending as a determinant. On the basis of the existing research literature, I set up a research hypothesis, which shall to be tested in the context of three selected countries. A research concept is described while possible limitations are taken into account. These considerations as well as potential promises of the concept are summed up in the conclusion.