Work packages

To undertake the manifold empirical studies of the project, the project lasts for three years and comprises four work packages: (1) interviews with taxpayers, (2)
exploration of existing survey data, (3) scale development and (4) experiments.

(1)  Interviews exploring the perception of power of authorities and trust in authorities

To clarify the concepts of perceived coercive and legitimate power of authorities and trust in authorities from taxpayers’ view, interviews will be conducted.

(2)   Exploration of existing survey data on power and trust in the tax context

To clarify the impact of perceived coercive and legitimate power on trust, existing data on determinants of tax behaviour can be used. The Dutch tax authorities are very innovative and interested in tax research, so they have gathered a comprehensive data set on tax behaviour and their determinants in the Dutch Tax Survey 2010. In collaboration with the Dutch Tax Office, specifically Manon de Groot and Sjoerd Goslinga, and Gerrit Antonides from Wageningen University, the data set will be examined.

(3)   Survey for measurement development

To assess the perceived coercive and legitimate power of authorities and trust in authorities, a questionnaire with relevant scales is developed. For the bases of social power and the concepts of reason-based and implicit trust existing scales are adapted for the tax context, taking into account the results of the interviews.

(4)     Experiments testing the impact of perceived power on trust and tax cooperation

To test the theoretically postulated extension of the power dimension into coercive and legitimate power of the Slippery Slope Framework (Kirchler, 2007; Kirchler et al., 2008) and the effect of changes of power, three experiments will be conducted.

In the first experiment, we will test how high and low perceived coercive and legitimate power together affect trust and tax cooperation. In the second experiment we examine, how changes of low or high perceived coercive power (or perceived legitimate power) to high or low perceived coercive power (or perceived legitimate power) affect trust and tax cooperation. The third experiment comprises both previous manipulations and assesses the impact of changes of high or low perceived coercive and legitimate power together to low or high perceived coercive and legitimate power on trust and tax cooperation.