Search

Taxation has gained considerable attention in the past few year and lot of studies have been done on tax evasion and tax compliance. This study assesses the level of tax and identifies factors that shape tax morale in Mauritius. A self-developed questionnaire was distributed to 250 randomly respondents and a logistic regression analysis was used to analyse data collected. A high degree of tax morale is required to achieve high level of tax compliance. The result shows that socio-demographic and socio economic factors have an impact on tax morale and it can be seen that social norm, fairness and equity, trust in government and in tax authority are determinants that shape tax morale. The findings are in line with that some authors who found out that that there is a positive correlation between inequity and tax evasion. The study recommended that population should be educated, tax system should be simplified, government should be fair and tax authority should respect the population. Key words: Tax evasion, logit model, cross sectional regression, tax morale.

Tax is the income which is paid to the government in order to fulfill the need of the public. However tax evasion is the act of not paying the tax by use of illegal ways. Allingham and Sandmo being the first researchers studying the tax evasion found a relationship of tax evasion with low penalty fees and a low detection. The tax evasion basically is affected by various factors but it also affects many economic factors. Sub Saharan Africa being a developing region is facing the phenomenon of tax evasion in a crucial way. This study measures the impact of the tax evasion on the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita of Sub Saharan Africa. The relationship between the GDP per capita and tax evasion is tested using the generalized least squared whereby it is found that there is a positive impact of tax evasion on the GDP per capita however the p-value states that the tax evasion is insignificant and is not an important component for the determination of the GDP per capita. Moreover in the presence of tax evasion, this study shows that GDP per capita has also a negative relationship with the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), positive relationship the Gross Domestic Fixed Capital Formation (GDFCF), a favorable connection with the export, a negative relationship with the import, a positive impact on the inflation and a negative relationship with the government expenditure. To fight against tax evasion for the economic benefit of Sub Saharan Africa, it is advised to review the tax system, to implement strict and severe penalties and very high fines for tax evaders. Moreover, the tax authorities of Sub Saharan Africa need to appoint more experts in auditing department to be able to detect the non-compliance tax payers easily and rapidly Key words: Tax evasion, cross sectional regression, tax morale.