Tax evasion is a pervasive problem in many countries. In particular, some developing countries do not collect even half of what they would if taxpayers complied with the written letter of the law. The academic literature has not been oblivious to the need to explain why people pay (or do not...

There is an ample literature on the determinants of tax compliance. Several field experiments have evaluated the effect and comparative relevance of sending deterrence and moral suasion messages to taxpayers. The effect of different delivery mechanisms, however, has not been evaluated so far....

Recent increases in political polarization in social media raise questions about the relationship between negative online messages and the decline in political trust around the world. To evaluate this claim causally, we implement a variant of the well-known trust game in a survey experiment with...

Political trust is foundational to democratic legitimacy, representative governance, and the provision of effective public policy. Various shocks can influence this trust, steering countries onto positive or negative trajectories. This study examines whether natural disasters can impact general...

Overconfidence leads to risky behavior, including when people are around guns. Does overconfidence also shape attitudes about gun ownership and use? We evaluate this possibility by conducting nationally representative surveys in six countries in the Americas, including the United States. Results...

What happens when the tax authority increases enforcement in one tax with compliance in other taxes? The very little evidence available is not conclusive. This paper presents a very simple analytical model that shows the conditions under which spillovers could be positive or negative in the...

We analyze the impact of elected competitors from the same constituency on legislative shirking in the German Bundestag from 1953 to 2017. The German electoral system ensures that there is always at least one federal legislator per constituency with a varying number of elected competitors from...

This short article looks at the development of an electoral gender gap over time, using, for the first time, actual ballot data collected in the Austrian state of Vienna. Vienna recorded female and male ballots separately in the years from 1954 to 1991. Firstly, using this unique design, we...

Voters would be better off if they removed politicians offering low-quality government by pursuing populist policies and re-elected those who improved government quality with sustainable policies. In many political contexts, including those with free and fair elections, voters do the opposite....

Every day, three women are murdered in the United States by a current or former partner. Yet policy action to prevent gender-based violence has been limited. Previous studies have highlighted the effect of female political representation on crimes against women in the developing world. This...