THE INFLUENCES OF TAX EDUCATION ON TAX EVASION

Abstract

This study aims to understand the role of tax education in taxpayer behaviour towards tax evasion. Based on mixed methods, this research intends to explore the differences in the perceptions of accountants and tax professionals and the general public of tax systems, tax avoidance knowledge and tax evasion individual assessment. A survey for quantitative data was applied, gathering data from 61 participants, and interviews were conducted with four participants for qualitative data collection. Spearman's Correlations test was employed to measure the influence of tax avoidance knowledge and tax system perception over tax evasion. The Kruskal–Wallis test was used to assess whether the groups had differences in the perception of the taxation topic. The main results show differences in the group responses, but the qualitative data could not corroborate. The same ambiguity was found in the correlations of tax avoidance knowledge and tax evasion assessments, which did allow the observation of the association between tax knowledge and tax evasion