欺瞒税务机关：厄瓜多尔的虚假企业与税收欺诈

中文摘要

企业逃税中有一种重要但尚未得到充分理解的形式，源于“幽灵企业”——这类虚假企业开具欺诈性发票，使其客户能够申报虚假扣除。我们利用厄瓜多尔交易层面的税收数据，为研究这一全球现象提供了独特视角。每年有5%的企业使用幽灵发票。在这些企业中，幽灵交易占采购额的14%。幽灵交易在大型企业和所有者收入较高的企业中普遍存在，并呈现出可疑模式，例如交易金额密集分布于金融系统门槛之下。一项以幽灵企业的客户而非幽灵企业本身为对象的创新执法干预，促成了大规模税款追缴。（JEL D22、H25、H26、K34、L25、O14）

Abstract

An important but poorly understood form of firm tax evasion arises from “ghost firms”—fake firms that issue fraudulent receipts so that their clients can claim false deductions. We provide a unique window into this global phenomenon using transaction-level tax data from Ecuador. Five percent of firms use ghost invoices annually. Among these firms, ghost transactions comprise 14 percent of purchases. Ghost transactions are prevalent among large firms and firms with high-income owners and exhibit suspicious patterns, such as bunching below financial system thresholds. An innovative enforcement intervention targeting ghost clients rather than ghosts themselves led to substantial tax recovery. (JEL D22, H25, H26, K34, L25, O14)