Les comportements de fraude fiscale. Le face à face contribuables — administration fiscale

Abstract

Tax evasion differs from other economic crimes owing to the fact that it is committed against a specific agent. This agent, the government, has the characteristic of being in charge, through the tax administration, of both the collection of taxes and the enforcement of measures designed to stamp out evasion. Thus, it has the resources, the power, to fight against this deviance. Therefore, it becomes obligatory to analyse, simultaneously, the behaviour of tax evaders and the mechanisms that are implemented to promote the collection of the amounts due by taxpayers. This justifies that we concentrate on this confrontation between taxpayers and tax administration. Moreover, tax evasion schemes, as they depend upon taxation rules as well as on the risks born by the individual in the case of detection, will then turn out to be evolutionary, implying parallel accommodation of deterrent actions undertaken by tax officials.