Template-Type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0

Author-Name:  Alexander James
Author-Name-First: Alexander
Author-Name-Last: James
Author-Email:  alex.james@uaa.alaska.edu
Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Economics, University of Alaska Anchorage

Author-Name:  Dilek Uz
Author-Name-First: Dilek
Author-Name-Last: Uz
Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Economics, University of Nevada Reno


Title: Oil Windfalls, Taxation, and Demand for Government Accountability

Abstract: What determines demand for government accountability? According to the theory of the rentier state, taxation engages an otherwise acquiescent electorate and increases demand for public transparency, accountability, and fiscal efficiency. This paper tests this theory using an online survey-experiment administered in the United States in which subjects are randomly assigned to one of five informational treatments describing the waste or embezzlement of income or oil-tax revenue. We then assess subject demand for accountability. Several insights emerge. First, intentions matter; embezzlement is punished more severely than incompetence. Second, income-tax embezzlement is punished more severely than oil-tax embezzlement, but only among high-income earners. Third, there is weak evidence that patronage (in the form of an oil-financed tax cut) reduces demand for accountability. Considered jointly, these results suggest an interesting Catch-22 in which a lack of taxation causes government waste and corruption, which is often then used to justify opposition to taxation.
 
Creation-date: 2022-10
Number: 2022-02

Handle: RePEc:ala:wpaper:2022-02
File-URL: http://www.econpapers.uaa.alaska.edu/RePEC/ala/wpaper/ALA202202.pdf
File-Format: Application/pdf

Classification-JEL: Q38, Q32, D72, H71
Keywords: Rentier States, Public Finance, Voter Apathy, Political Resource Curse, Survey Experiment
Publication-Status: