Trust In Government Research Articles

Tax Knowledge, Trust in Government, and Voluntary Tax Compliance: Insights From an Emerging Economy

This paper examines whether tax knowledge, tax fairness and trust affect voluntary tax compliance among small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Given the growing budget deficits and debt levels of developing economies, we contend that an understanding of the factors associated with voluntary tax compliance among SMEs could enhance tax revenue mobilization. Although the majority of businesses are SMEs, questions about their tax compliance have become topical among stakeholders due to perceived low levels of compliance, hence, an investigation into the factors underlying their tax compliance behavior is critical for stakeholders, particularly governments and tax authorities. We used a survey-based approach to sample 341 SMEs operating within Ghana’s oil city of Secondi-Takoradi. We employed the structural equation modeling (SEM) technique to analyze the retrieved data. Generally, our empirical results indicate that social factors and behavioral motivations are key determinants of voluntary tax compliance among SMEs in Ghana. Specifically, our results suggest that SMEs’ perception of tax fairness, knowledge about the tax system, and trust in government are significant predictors of voluntary tax compliance. Additionally, we find a significant mediating role of tax fairness in the relationship between tax knowledge and voluntary tax compliance. As governments seek to raise tax revenues and manage public debt, our results provide important insights into social and behavioral factors that could aid in enhancing tax compliance.

CIVIL LIABILITY OF SELF-GOVERNMENT BODIES

This article provides a comprehensive exploration of civil liability within self-government bodies, examining the legal framework, sources of liability, and strategies for accountability and risk mitigation. Self-government bodies wield significant power in shaping local affairs and services, yet they face complex challenges in navigating the balance between autonomy and accountability. The concept of sovereign immunity, historical precedent, and evolving legal standards shape the landscape of civil liability, with implications for transparency, trust, and effective governance. Key sources of liability include tort claims, constitutional violations, and statutory obligations, posing financial and reputational risks for government entities.

Inclusive Digital Upliftment in Odisha a Public value perspective

Digital divide is part of inclusive digitalisation. Technology Acceptance Model explains different dimensions of technology adaptation in a society. This paper is investigating the Information Communication Technology acceptance among the graduates from Koraput, Kalahandi, and Balangir districts of Odisha, these districts are considering as the most backward district in India (NITI Aayog 2019 report). How young technology adopted people are considering government services creation in the state through the eyes of public value. This paper is adopting the model developed by Jean Damascene Twizeyimana for the assessment of public value in developing states. Improved public services, improved administration, open government capabilities, improved ethical behaviour and professionalism, improved trust and confidence in government, and improved social value and wellbeing are measured in this paper for understanding the value creation among the youth. The gap in the service creation and usage from the e-Governance services make an inclusive society, this paper can wrap out the eGovernance services gap which will be a model for government implementation in all over the state.

보건의료 개인정보 유출 및 민영화 우려가 데이터 공유 인식에 미치는 영향 연구

The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of concerns about healthcare data leakage and privatization on the perception of data sharing. In particular, an analysis of the mediating effects of regulatory awareness, corporate trust, government trust, and information human rights awareness was conducted to identify factors affecting the relationship between concerns about data leakage and privatization and awareness of data sharing. As a result of the analysis, there was no direct effect between concerns about data leakage and awareness of data sharing, but concerns about privatization were found to have a direct effect with awareness of data sharing. Second, the mediating effect of regulatory awareness and corporate trust was found between concerns about data leakage and awareness of data sharing. Third, between concerns about privatization and awareness of data sharing, only the mediating effect of corporate trust showed statistical significance.

The role of government trust and responsiveness in shaping sustainable tourism in West Sumatera, Indonesia

The role of government trust and responsiveness in shaping sustainable tourism in West Sumatera, Indonesia

Theoretical foundations of voluntary tax compliance: evidence from a developing country

Tax non-compliance is a persistent problem that is becoming increasingly common worldwide. The main objective of this study is to examine the factors that influence voluntary tax compliance among large taxpayers in Ethiopia based on the theoretical foundation of tax compliance. This study used an ordinary logit regression model, a closed-ended questionnaire with 1550 taxpayers, and quantitative data analysis. The regression analysis shows that tax compliance behavior is positively and significantly influenced by government trust, taxpayers’ tax knowledge, tax system fairness, and rewards. However, compliance costs negatively and significantly affect tax compliance. To improve voluntary tax compliance, the government and tax authorities need to be more open and responsible. They must also increase tax awareness among taxpayers through websites, seminars, and the media. Ultimately, they must reduce compliance costs and deliver tangible and intangible benefits to honest taxpayers.

Association of National Identity and Trust in Government with COVID-19 Vaccination and Brand Choice in Taiwan.

In Taiwan, hesitancy regarding COVID-19 vaccination centered more on the choice of vaccine brand than on the decision to vaccinate. However, there is limited research exploring the factors influencing COVID-19 vaccine brand preferences from a sociopolitical perspective. Thus, we aimed to examine how Taiwanese national identity and trust in government influence vaccination status and vaccine brand choice, using longitudinal data from 2020, 2021, and 2023. This study utilized data from the Taiwan Panel Study of Family Dynamics 2020 survey, and combined it with data from two self-administered surveys conducted in 2021 and 2023. We focused on four vaccines commonly administered in Taiwan: AstraZeneca, Moderna, Pfizer-BioNTech, and the domestically-developed Medigen. Using Poisson regression models with robust standard errors, we assessed the effects of national identity and trust in government on the choice of COVID-19 vaccine brand. By analyzing data from 2361 participants, we found that national identity and trust in government were associated with the likelihood of COVID-19 vaccination, the number of vaccine doses received, and the brand of vaccine taken. Those who identified themselves as Taiwanese were more inclined to receive the Medigen and AstraZeneca vaccines, but less willing to receive Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Those who trusted the government were more likely to prefer and receive the Medigen vaccine. Conversely, those who didn't trust the government were less likely to prefer Medigen and AstraZeneca vaccines, but were willing to receive Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Vaccine brand preferences and uptake in Taiwan were affected by individuals' national identity and their trust in government. This highlights the critical role of sociopolitical factors in shaping public health strategies.

Trusted Sources of Information and COVID-19 Vaccination Among Black Adults in Chicago.

Examine trust in sources of COVID-19 information and vaccination status. Cross-sectional. Chicago, Illinois. Convenience sample of 538 Black adults surveyed between September 2021 and March 2022. Trust in sources of COVID-19 information, COVID-19 vaccination. Using latent class analysis, we identified classes of trust in sources of COVID-19 information. We considered predictors of class membership using multinomial logistic regression and examined unadjusted and adjusted associations between trust class membership and COVID-19 vaccination while accounting for uncertainty in class assignment. Our analytic sample (n = 522) was predominantly aged 18-34 (52%) and female (71%). Results suggested a four-class solution: (1) low trust, (2) high trust in all sources, (3) high trust in doctor and government, and (4) high trust in doctor, faith leader, and family. Unadjusted odds of vaccination were greater in the high trust in all sources (OR 2.0, 95% CI 1.2-3.2), high trust in doctor and government (OR 2.7, 95% CI 1.4-5.3), and high trust in doctor, faith leader, and family classes (OR 2.1, 95% CI 1.2, 3.9) than the low trust class. However, these associations were not significant after adjustment for sociodemographic and health status factors. Although COVID-19 vaccination varied across trust classes, our adjusted findings do not suggest a direct association between trust and vaccination, reflecting complexities in the vaccine decision-making process.

Antecedents of loyalty to bank: The role of trust in cryptocurrency and concern in investing

In recent years, cryptocurrency has become a topic frequently discussed by investors. Cryptocurrency is a type of digital money that was first intended to be used as a medium of exchange but has since evolved into an investment tool. This study examines the influence of cryptocurrency knowledge, trust in government, transaction speed, and herding behavior on trust in cryptocurrency. The impact of trust in cryptocurrency on concern about investing, the influence of trust in cryptocurrency on loyalty to banks, the influence of concern about investing on loyalty to banks, and the impact of trust in cryptocurrency on loyalty to banks mediated by concern about investing. The research respondents were from the general public, who knew about cryptocurrency, totaling 200 respondents. This study used a purposive sampling technique via Smart PLS. The results of this research show that cryptocurrency knowledge, transaction speed, and herding behavior positively affect trust in cryptocurrencies. By contrast, trust in the government does not significantly affect trust in cryptocurrencies. Trust in cryptocurrency has a negative effect on concern about investing, trust in cryptocurrency has a negative impact on loyalty to the bank, concern about investing has a positive effect on loyalty to the bank, and concern about investing mediates between trust in cryptocurrency and loyalty to the bank.

Blockchain Opportunities for Water Resources Management: A Comprehensive Review

Blockchain technology has been used for the digitalization of physical asset management and data management processes in many areas in the industry and academia, including the water domain. Its potential as an immutable data storage system and smart contract integration has provided a plethora of use cases and utility in the domain of hydrology and water resources. This systematic review critically examines the application of blockchain technology in the field of water resources and hydrology. By analyzing 104 academic publications and 37 non-academic studies from 2017 to 15 October 2022, this paper identifies the current state of blockchain applications in water management, delineates their potential use cases, and assesses their practical utility and scalability. Despite the theoretical promise of blockchain for enhancing water governance, data security, and stakeholder trust, the review reveals a noticeable gap between theoretical potential and the existence of workable, real-time applications specifically in water resources management. The findings indicate that while blockchain technology has been effectively implemented in various sectors, its adoption in hydrological domain is still emerging, with limited empirical evidence to support full-scale deployment. The paper concludes with a call for more empirical research to validate theoretical benefits, address scalability and interoperability challenges, and integrate blockchain technology with real-time data networks for sustainable water management practices.

What explains elite affective polarization? Evidence from Canadian politicians

AbstractConcerns about affective polarization are on the rise globally, and it has been associated with negative outcomes such as diminished trust in government and discrimination against out‐partisans. While elected politicians are typically thought to be a major source of mass‐level affective polarization, and despite the policy and representation consequences of heightened partisan hostility in legislatures, existing research has focused almost exclusively on the measurement and explanation of affective polarization among citizens. As a result, we know far less about the magnitude and sources of elite affective polarization. Here, we take a step towards addressing this gap using an original survey of hundreds of Canadian local politicians, a setting uniquely situated for addressing the role of a host of individual‐level and institutional‐level predictors of affective polarization. We find that Canadian local politicians are, on average, less affectively polarized than the citizens they represent. However, levels of affective polarization among these politicians vary considerably, with higher levels of affective polarization among politicians who are ideologues, partisans, and who harbor strong progressive ambition. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for research on affective polarization and describe the need for comparative studies of affective polarization among political elites.

Fear, trust, and compliance with COVID-19 measures: a study of the mediating effect of trust in government on the relationship between fear and compliance

Abstract As the COVID-19 pandemic became an unprecedented global threat, it was accompanied by an increase in trust in governments as well as fear among the public. Previous research suggests that both institutional trust and fear contribute to the willingness of citizens to comply with anti-pandemic measures. Moreover, fear during the contagion also increases trust in government. This article presents a test of the mediation of the effects of fear on compliance through trust. In addition, it differentiates between three different facets of COVID-19-related fear: fear of the disease, fear of economic consequences, and fear of political consequences. The results suggest that while fear of the disease increases compliance, fear of political consequences decreases compliance. Moreover, the effects of fear are mediated through trust in government. The negative impact of fear of political consequences on compliance increased between April and December 2020.

Unveiling the influence of transparency in risk communication: Shifting from information disclosure to uncertainty reduction

While the importance of government transparency is extensively discussed in risk communication literature, its practical application in risk contexts presents intricate challenges. This study introduces a redefined concept of transparency in the context of risk, covering two dimensions: information disclosure and uncertainty reduction. To investigate the impact of transparency, ranging from mere information disclosure to significant uncertainty reduction, a hierarchical multiple regression model is employed. Specifically, trust in government serves as a benchmark for information disclosure, while indicators for information disclosure strategies and public vulnerability are incorporated into the model as proxies for uncertainty reduction. The proposed model undergoes validation in a city lockdown scenario in China using self-report data from 435 college students, with anxiety serving as a benchmark for transparency outcomes. The findings suggest that indicators of uncertainty reduction (information disclosure strategies, individual vulnerability) exert much larger effects on anxiety than mere information disclosure (indicated by government trust). This implies that government transparency should prioritize uncertainty reduction, involving diverse strategies and addressing public vulnerabilities.

Political trust in the age of coronavirus: experiences in Mukuru, Nairobi, Kenya

This paper examines declining political trust at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic in the informal settlements of Mukuru Kayaba, Mukuru kwa Njenga, and Mukuru kwa Ruben; part of the Mukuru Informal Settlement located in Nairobi, Kenya. The average resident lives on $1.90–$3.50/day with no financial security net. During the COVID-19 pandemic governmental restrictions on movement and business operations, residents of Mukuru living at the extreme poverty level were unable to meet their basic needs. Trust in government was diminished, made worse by excessive force from armed officers of the Provincial Administration. Using qualitative and quantitative data, this research concludes that the lack of state support during the pandemic has led to further decline of political trust from residents of Mukuru.

The Roles of Trust in Government and Sense of Community in the COVID-19 Contact Tracing Privacy Calculus: Mixed Method Study Using a 2-Wave Survey and In-Depth Interviews.

Contact tracing technology has been adopted in many countries to aid in identifying, evaluating, and handling individuals who have had contact with those infected with COVID-19. Singapore was among the countries that actively implemented the government-led contact tracing program known as TraceTogether. Despite the benefits the contact tracing program could provide to individuals and the community, privacy issues were a significant barrier to individuals' acceptance of the program. Building on the privacy calculus model, this study investigates how the perceptions of the 2 key groups (ie, government and community members) involved in the digital contact tracing factor into individuals' privacy calculus of digital contact tracing. Using a mixed method approach, we conducted (1) a 2-wave survey (n=674) and (2) in-depth interviews (n=12) with TraceTogether users in Singapore. Using structural equation modeling, this study investigated how trust in the government and the sense of community exhibited by individuals during the early stage of implementation (time 1) predicted privacy concerns, perceived benefits, and future use intentions, measured after the program was fully implemented (time 2). Expanding on the survey results, this study conducted one-on-one interviews to gain in-depth insights into the privacy considerations involved in digital contact tracing. The results from the survey showed that trust in the government increased perceived benefits while decreasing privacy concerns regarding the use of TraceTogether. Furthermore, individuals who felt a connection to community members by participating in the program (ie, the sense of community) were more inclined to believe in its benefits. The sense of community also played a moderating role in the influence of government trust on perceived benefits. Follow-up in-depth interviews highlighted that having a sense of control over information and transparency in the government's data management were crucial factors in privacy considerations. The interviews also highlighted surveillance as the most prevalent aspect of privacy concerns regarding TraceTogether use. In addition, our findings revealed that trust in the government, particularly the perceived transparency of government actions, was most strongly associated with concerns regarding the secondary use of data. Using a mixed method approach involving a 2-wave survey and in-depth interview data, we expanded our understanding of privacy decisions and the privacy calculus in the context of digital contact tracing. The opposite influences of privacy concerns and perceived benefit on use intention suggest that the privacy calculus in TraceTogether might be viewed as a rational process of weighing between privacy risks and use benefits to make an uptake decision. However, our study demonstrated that existing perceptions toward the provider and the government in the contact tracing context, as well as the perception of the community triggered by TraceTogether use, may bias user appraisals of privacy risks and the benefits of contact tracing.

Trust in government and flood preparedness among households in developing countries’ megacities: the case of Jakarta, Indonesia

Trust in government and flood preparedness among households in developing countries’ megacities: the case of Jakarta, Indonesia

Antigambling interventions and corporate financialization: Evidence from China

This study investigates the impact of local antigambling interventions (AGIs) on corporate financialization. From the perspective of formal institutions’ influence on culture, our findings suggest that firms located in regions with more effective AGIs exhibit lower levels of financialization. Mechanism tests show that AGIs reduce local risk preferences, subsequently influencing corporate financialization. Heterogeneity tests reveal that the main results are more pronounced when government trust is stronger, cultural transmission efficiency is higher, local firm interactions are more extensive, and community attention to antigambling initiatives is greater. This study enhances the understanding of the influence of the institutional environment on corporate investment decisions.

Trust in Government in a Changing World: Shocks, Tax Evasion, and Economic Growth

Abstract Governments are always dealing with unexpected shocks, like wars, terrorism, financial crises, natural disasters, and the like. A recent prominent example is the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Since early 2020, governments around the world have enacted a range of unprecedented measures in an attempt to protect their citizens, with quite mixed results. This varied record has in turn had dramatic effects on peoples’ perceptions of their government, especially on their trust in government and so on their willingness to obey the many government mandates generated by the pandemic. This willingness to obey government mandates extends well beyond pandemic policies to all other dimensions of government laws and regulations. An important dimension of individual compliance with government mandates is tax evasion. What will be the effects of the pandemic and the associated government policies on post-pandemic tax evasion and economic growth, especially via the effects of government policies on “trust” in the government? In this paper we incorporate both tax evasion and trust in an endogenous growth model in order to examine the short and long run impacts on tax evasion of various shocks – a pandemic shock, a government policies shock, and a tax morale shock (and the resulting impact on trust in government). We then use real data on 11 representative economies to simulate these effects, economies representing developed and developing countries as well as economies representing governments that opted for various policy responses to COVID-19, modelled as a labor productivity shock. We find that varied public policy responses to the pandemic have immediate and persistent impacts on tax evasion in the short and long run, largely via their effects on trust in government. We also find that these evasion impacts vary in important and predictable ways that depend especially on whether government dealt effectively or not with the pandemic. Our methodology is readily adapted to examine the effects of other shocks and their respective policy responses on trust in government, tax evasion, and economic growth.

Compliance with COVID-19 preventative health measures in the United Kingdom: a latent profile analysis.

Governments have adopted unprecedented measures to assist in slowing the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, but compliance varies among individuals. This UK study uses latent profile analysis to identify four classes of individuals on factors believed to influence compliance. Those who sought health information from authoritative sources and actively sought information from multiple sources were most compliant. Profile differences in compliance and vaccination status were also primarily driven by trust in healthcare institutions over trust in government. These findings contribute to understanding compliance profiles and emphasise the importance of authoritative information and trust in healthcare systems.

The mediating role of trust in government in intergenerational transmission of fertility intentions.

China's one-child policy was in effect from 1982 to 2015. However, the literature examining the association between people's trust in local government and intergenerational transmission of fertility intentions is scarce. To fill this gap, we investigated the impact of individuals' sibship size on their ideal number of children, the mediating effect of their trust in local government on the issue of fertility between two successive generations, and the moderating effect of education level on sibship size related to trust in local governments. Based on the 2019 Chinese Social Survey data, 2,340 respondents aged 18-35 participated in the analysis. The results showed that (i) individuals' number of siblings significantly positively predicted their ideal number of children; (ii) individuals' number of siblings significantly negatively predicted their trust in the local government, which in turn significantly negatively influenced fertility intentions; (iii) the mediating mechanism was significant in residents with higher levels of education, but not in people with lower degrees of education. Fertility-boosting incentives can prioritize couples who are the only child in their family. It is necessary for local governments to improve their credibility and strengthen their pregnancy-related communication with groups with higher levels of education.