The Nexus of Tax Education and Compliance Among Small Business Enterprises (PDF)

Academic Paper from the year 2019 in the subject Business economics - Accounting and Taxes, , course: Tax compliance, language: English, abstract: The study set out to investigate the influence of tax education on tax compliance. It unearthed a lacuna between tax education and tax compliance which indicated an interplay between the theories of economic deterrent, reasoned action and the theory of planned behavior. Tax non-compliance was attributed to unfairness, dishonesty by colleagues submitting incorrect tax returns, and the complexity of the tax system and tax forms.

The issue of tax compliance from SMEs in developing countries has remained a blighting problem for a long time. Despite tax education being diagnosed as the panacea for improving tax compliance from small business owners, the situation has not changed. A divide regarding the issue of tax education as influencing the collection of tax from SMEs still exists among researchers.

Some scholars indicate a positive effect of tax education on compliance and others view tax education as a recipe for propagating tax evasion. However, for developmental projects to improve the lives of the citizenry, educating tax-payers aims to improve revenue collection from this category of business people. This study employed an exploratory concurrent mixed research approach on 98 SMEs operating within the Ojtiwarongo district.