Business Commons^™

The Influence Of In-House Tax Expertise On Corporate Tax Avoidance, Kimberly Hutton Honaker

Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects

Allegations of tax abuse at Enron, WorldCom, and others generated scrutiny from regulators, public markets, and the media. In response, accounting researchers have sought to understand factors that drive corporate tax avoidance. While historical research has focused on firm characteristics, little emphasis has been placed on the executive who develops corporate tax strategy.

This study addresses this issue by considering how the internal tax function (ITF) and in-house tax expertise influence tax avoidance. I examine the association between tax avoidance, denoted BOOK_ETR, which is measured as the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles effective tax rate, and (1) the existence of an …

Tax Aggressiveness And Auditor Resignation, Yoonseok Zang, Beng Wee Goh, Chee Yeow Lim, Terry Shevlin

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine the relation between client tax aggressiveness and auditor‟s resignation decision. Consistent with the agency view of tax avoidance which suggests that client tax aggressiveness can increase litigation and reputational risk to auditors and increase the potential conflict with managers, we find a positive association between our proxies for tax aggressiveness and the likelihood that an auditor resigns from an audit engagement. Further, this association is stronger when external monitoring of the client firm is less effective, when there is greater potential for agency problems in the client firm, and when the economic importance of the fees received from …

Tax Aggressiveness And Auditor Resignation, Yoonseok Zang, Beng Wee Goh, Chee Yeow Lim, Terry Shevlin

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine the relation between client tax aggressiveness and auditor‟s resignation decision. Consistent with the agency view of tax avoidance which suggests that client tax aggressiveness can increase litigation and reputational risk to auditors and increase the potential conflict with managers, we find a positive association between our proxies for tax aggressiveness and the likelihood that an auditor resigns from an audit engagement. Further, this association is stronger when external monitoring of the client firm is less effective, when there is greater potential for agency problems in the client firm, and when the economic importance of the fees received from …