MEASURING TRUE SALES AND UNDERREPORTING WITH MATCHED FIRM-LEVEL SURVEY AND TAX OFFICE DATA

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Zhou, Fujin; Oostendorp, Remco
• 署名单位: Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam; Tinbergen Institute; Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam; Tinbergen Institute; University of Oxford
• 刊物名称: REVIEW OF ECONOMICS AND STATISTICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0034-6535
• DOI: 10.1162/REST_a_00408
• 发表日期: 2014-07
• 页码: 563-576
• 关键词: multiple-indicators; shadow economy; evasion; size; PRODUCTIVITY; determinants; MODEL; hide

摘要

This paper uses firm-level survey data matched with official tax records to estimate the unobserved true sales of formal firms in Mongolia. Taking into account firm-level incentives to comply with taxes and a production function technology linking unobserved true sales with observable firm-level production characteristics, we derive a multiple-indicators, multiple-causes model predicting true sales. We find that firms underreport sales to the tax office by 38.6%, but firm-level survey data also suffer from significant underreporting. Finally, we compare our approach with two alternative approaches of measuring underreporting and discuss the practical implications of the findings for firm-level analyses of underreporting.