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Authors
Annette Alstadsæter (Skatteforsk), Niels Johannesen (Centre for Business Taxation at Oxford University, CEBI - University of Copenhagen), Ségal Le Guern Herry (Aix Marseille Univ, CNRS, AMSE) and Gabriel Zucman (International Tax Observatory, Paris School of Economics)
Abstract
This paper uses administrative data to analyze wealth flows from Norway to offshore tax havens before and after a major improvement of global financial transparency: automatic exchange of bank account information between tax authorities. We present three results suggesting that the policy is a significant deterrent of offshore tax evasion: First, taxpayers who become wealthy are much less likely to shift wealth to offshore banks. Second, when wealth does flow to offshore banks, it is much less likely to reduce domestic tax payments. Third, there is no increase in the use of complex ownership structures for offshore wealth flows.
JEL Codes
H26, H87, K42
Key words
tax evasion, tax compliance, tax enforcement, information exchange, financial
transparency