Abstract
In the last decade, advances in technology have significantly disrupted the way firms provide goods and services. At the forefront of this technological disruption is the sharing economy, where individuals earn income by providing services or sharing assets through peer-to-peer (P2P) platforms. With global revenues in the sharing economy projected to increase substantially in the next decade, income from this economy will continue to be an important source of tax revenues for governments around the world. However, sceptics argue that the sharing economy inherently lends itself to dishonest reporting of taxable income. We employ an online experiment, using 746 taxpayers, to observe whether the prosocial benefits often promoted by P2P platforms reduce honest reporting of taxable sharing economy income. Consistent with moral licensing theory, we find that earning income from a prosocial-oriented P2P platform liberates taxpayers to dishonestly report their sharing economy income, and this result is fully driven by taxpayers whose personal values are incongruent with values promoted by the P2P platform. Our paper contributes to the limited but growing research on the sharing economy and its implications for ethical decisions. It also adds to the moral licensing literature by identifying value congruency as an important moderator for moral licensing effect.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 181-205 |
Number of pages | 25 |
Journal | Journal of Business Ethics |
Volume | 167 |
Issue number | 2 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Nov 1 2020 |
Externally published | Yes |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:We gratefully acknowledge the helpful comments by Joanna Andrejkow, Jonathan Farrar, Darren Henderson, Kelsey Kirbyson, Chima Mbagwu, Bruce McConomy, Sara Wick, Chris Wong, Michael Wynes, and Zhuoyi Zhao. We thank Zhuoyi Zhao for her excellent research assistance. We gratefully acknowledge funding provided by the CPA-CAAA Research Grant, the CPA Ontario Centre for Capital Markets and Behavioral Decision Making, the KPMG Accounting Fellowship Fund and the Grant Thornton Fellowship Fund for this study.
Funding Information:
We gratefully acknowledge the helpful comments by Joanna Andrejkow, Jonathan Farrar, Darren Henderson, Kelsey Kirbyson, Chima Mbagwu, Bruce McConomy, Sara Wick, Chris Wong, Michael Wynes, and Zhuoyi Zhao. We thank Zhuoyi Zhao for her excellent research assistance. We gratefully acknowledge funding provided by the CPA-CAAA Research Grant and the KPMG Accounting Fellowship Fund for this study.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020, Springer Nature B.V.
ASJC Scopus Subject Areas
- Business and International Management
- General Business,Management and Accounting
- Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous)
- Economics and Econometrics
- Law