Some aspects of tax operating costs, with particular reference to personal taxation in the United Kingdom

• Main Author: Dean, Peter N.
• Published: University of Bath 1975
• Subjects: 336.2
• Online Access: https://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.453333

In tax administration, costs are borne by two principal parties: tax raising departments of Government and tax payers themselves. Government costs are the subject of regular statistical reports but little is known of the so-called hidden costs falling on tax payers: the costs of complying with taxes imposed by the Government, The thesis examines these two aspects of tax operating costs with particular reference to personal taxation in the UK. The approach adopted specifically recognises that cost is only one criterion for evaluating administrative efficiency. The criterion of effectiveness (the degree to which actual revenues collected approach potential revenues) is integrated within a theory of tax costs. The behavioural factors which underlie effectiveness are examined in a fairly lengthy digression in Chapter 2. Chapter 3 returns to the analysis of costs with a discussion of questions of principle and problems of measurement encountered in previous compliance cost studies. This paves the way for a discussion of recent empirical work on the compliance cost of personal taxation in the UK in Chapter 4. Chapter 5 sets out the methodological issues likely to be encountered in applying a system of productivity measurement to the Inland Revenue. Chapter 6 starts with a discussion of the shortcomings of current information concerning administrative costs of direct taxation in the UK. It then attempts to apply a rough form of productivity measurement to the Inland Revenue along the lines suggested in the previous Chapter and ends with an evaluation from published sources of recent changes in Inland Revenue efficiency.