Unwilling or Unable to Cheat? Evidence from a Randomized Tax Audit Experiment in Denmark

NBER WORKING PAPER SERIESUNWILLING OR UNABLE TO CHEAT? EVIDENCE FROM A RANDOMIZEDTAX AUDIT EXPERIMENT IN DENMARKHenrik J. KlevenMartin B. KnudsenClaus T. KreinerSøren PedersenEmmanuel SaezWorking Paper 15769http://www.nber.org/papers/w15769NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH1050 Massachusetts AvenueCambridge, MA 02138February 2010We are grateful to Jakob Egholt Sogaard for outstanding research assistance. We thank Oriana Bandiera,Richard Blundell, Raj Chetty, John Friedman, William Gentry, Wojciech Kopczuk, Monica Singhal,Joel Slemrod, and numerous seminar participants for comments and discussions. Financial supportfrom ESRC Grant RES 000 22 3241, NSF Grant SES 0850631, and a grant from the Economic PolicyResearch Network (EPRN) is gratefully acknowledged. The responsibility for all interpretations andconclusions expressed in this paper lie solely with the authors and do not necessarily represent theviews of the Danish tax administration (SKAT), the Danish government, or the National Bureau ofEconomic Research.© 2010 by Henrik J. Kleven, Martin B. Knudsen, Claus T. Kreiner, Søren Pedersen, and EmmanuelSaez. All rights reserved. Short sections of text, not to exceed two paragraphs, may be quoted withoutexplicit permission provided that full credit, including © notice, is given to the source.Unwilling or Unable to Cheat? Evidence from a Randomized Tax Audit Experiment in DenmarkHenrik J. Kleven, Martin B. Knudsen, Claus T. Kreiner, Søren Pedersen ...