Publications of the Research Unit Corporate Taxation and Public Finance

  1. ZEW Discussion Paper No. 25-067 // 2025

    Harnessing Deductions to Increase Tax Compliance and Formalization

    We evaluate a tax reform in Ecuador that introduced generous deductions from personal income taxes (PIT), encouraging consumers to request receipts. The reform addresses tax evasion by targeting small…

  2. ZEW Discussion Paper No. 25-066 // 2025

    Effects of the Reverse Charge Mechanism on VAT Gaps

    The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the effect of reverse-charge mechanism (RCM) implementation on VAT compliance using an overall, countrylevel measure of VAT compliance, the VAT gap. The VAT gap is…

  3. Refereed Journal // 2025

    Invitation Messages for Business Surveys: A Multi-Armed Bandit Experiment

    We investigate the design of a survey invitation message targeted at businesses. By varying five key elements of the survey invitation, we implement a full-factorial experiment with adaptive randomization…

  4. ZEW Discussion Paper No. 25-059 // 2025

    Doubling Down Political Budget Cycles: The Role of State-Owned Enterprises

    We study the degree and nature of political budget cycles in public investments when two instruments are available: investments by core governments and, more indirectly, by state-owned enterprises (SOEs). While…

  5. ZEW policy brief No. 25-13 // 2025

    QDMTTs Leave Geographic Disparity Between Increased Pillar Two Costs and Revenues

    For the better part of the last decade, the global minimum tax, or Pillar Two, has dominated international tax policy discussions. Developing out of the Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) Project at the…