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Tax sales intersect with the market, housing policy and socioeconomic matters, but the topic in this context is understudied. The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether and how land banking is more effective in fostering positive property outcomes than tax lien sales and what market-based measures can be combined with land banking to reuse tax delinquent, vacant and abandoned properties.

This paper analyzes the consequences of tax lien sales and land banking in Indianapolis, Indiana, the USA. Various local data sources are used.

This paper finds that land banking, when compared to tax lien sales, results in less tax delinquency, less vacancy and abandonment, more increase in assessed value and fewer ownership changes after sales. Also, this paper shows the contributions of non-profit and for-profit developers as business partners to land banks.

This paper demonstrates the utility of the land banks that have become prevalent in some states in the USA over the past 20 years. The results of this paper recommend the realistic approach of combining government intervention and market forces.

This paper sheds light on the US practice of tax lien sales. It goes largely unnoticed, but malpractice risks harming the vulnerable members of community.

Housing policy needs to find common ground with the market. It is a dilemma, more or less, for every country. The results of this paper suggest a harmonized public policy approach that includes land banking and the market can be effective in combatting with troubled properties.

This paper investigates the financial risk factors associated with fiscal distress in local governments. We hypothesize that fiscal distress is positively correlated with revenue concentration and debt usage, while negatively correlated with administrative costs and entity resources. The regression model results in a prediction of the likelihood of fiscal distress, which correctly classifies up to 91% of the sample as fiscally distressed or not. The model also allows for an analysis of the impact of a change in a risk factor on the likelihood of fiscal distress. A decrease in intergovernmental revenues as a percent of total revenues and an increase in administrative expenditures as a percent of total expenditures have the biggest influences on reducing the likelihood of fiscal distress.

Self-employed business owners are far less compliant in reporting and paying their taxes than wage earners (employees). Discounted utility theory suggests that people act rationally and would not be willing to prepay an upcoming obligation. Mental accounting and behavioral economics theory take a different view, asserting that taxpayers will prefer a pay-as-you-go pattern (i.e., regularity). In response to these opposing theories, we conducted a behavioral experiment to see if a taxpayer who is given the opportunity to pay estimated federal income taxes monthly (instead of quarterly) will do so, and also whether they are less delinquent than those in the control group, who paid estimated federal income taxes quarterly. Our results indicate that when respondents were explicitly offered the opportunity to make monthly rather than only quarterly payments, the majority of the respondents opted to make monthly prepayments at least once. Additionally, those with an explicit option to pay as often as monthly rather than quarterly had significantly fewer dollars of delinquency. Paying more frequently could alleviate some budgeting pressures for the self-employed and result in fewer delinquencies to be collected at the federal level.

About 500 municipalities have declared bankruptcy since Congress passed the Municipal Bankruptcy Act in 1937. Based on the experiences of these municipalities and the municipal bankruptcy literature, this paper develops a theory of why municipalities go bankrupt and discusses various ways to prevent other municipalities from going bankrupt. The paper identifies three-dimensional factors that may make municipalities go bankrupt: long-term and short-term, political and economic, and internal and external perspectives. The paper ends with an observation that government failure in the form of municipal bankruptcy can be reduced by strengthening the audit powers of the states and by utilizing more municipal bond and liability insurance policies.

The International Fuel Tax Agreement (IFTA) was established to reduce the complexities of reporting, allocating, and collecting diesel fuel taxes from interstate commercial carriers operating in multiple jurisdictions. This paper examines IFTA’s effectiveness as a multistate tax administration model from the perspective of the states. We identify three criteria of effectiveness and use a survey of IFTA officials in the member states and provinces as well as additional data provided by IFTA, Inc to assess IFTA’s effectiveness. We conclude that (1) IFTA promotes inter-jurisdictional cooperation and revenue transfers; (2) carriers do not locate disproportionately in low tax jurisdictions; and (3) IFTA’s audit system, which relies on carrier record-keeping, may not be effectively preventing tax evasion.

This chapter presents a seven-part case developed for use in a graduate-level tax planning class. The case is organized in a taxpayer/business “life-cycle” approach. Over the semester the case follows a married couple as they consider a number of investments, start a business, and expand the business. As the case progresses, the couple faces increasingly complex tax and business issues. The couple eventually winds down their involvement in the business and begins to plan for their retirement years. This chapter also provides a review of behavioral tax research published in the top accounting journals over the period 2004–2013. The chapter concludes with a discussion of how the case could be adapted by behavioral tax researchers in their research programs and perhaps by accounting firms in their training programs.

The Lagos State land use charge (LUC) 2001 represents a radical and wholesome restructuring of the entire erstwhile land‐based tax system in the state, and the first of its kind in Nigeria. The purpose of this paper is to examine how this maiden holistic intervention in property tax administration in Nigeria has fared in its first nine years.

Primary data were garnered from stakeholders through personal interviews and structured questionnaires, while secondary data include information from the enabling act and other‐related materials.

It was noted that the intervention failed to conform to best practice both in policy and administration. As a result, the reform has not ceased to generate controversies, has enjoyed limited acceptability, and achieved limited success.

Taking a cue from the experiences of countries that have demonstrated best practices in property tax reform, the paper proffers suggestions, covering both policy (e.g. extensive stakeholders' consultation) and administration (e.g. improved links between tax payment and provision of local services) that would help to sustain the reform intervention and make it sufficiently worthwhile.

This paper provides a comprehensive account of how the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) successfully managed organizational transformation to achieve significantly increased customer satisfaction, enhanced organizational agility, and dramatic reduction in tax arrears. The case study reaffirms that the soft issues are the hard issues in reengineering. Indeed, the recognition by IRAS that people resource issues are at the heart of change is the major factor for its success. In addition to tackling people issues, the transformation experience of IRAS also reveals the need to integrate the traditional change models more tightly in managing large‐scale change. The inability of IRAS in anticipating all major consequences of their change actions suggests an improvisational model of change management. Organizations embarking on large‐scale transformation should consciously build their internal capabilities to tackle emergent changes (e.g. establishing the information systems for change, nurturing people resources, and providing slack resources).

The purpose of this paper is to explore the application of a profit and loss sharing approach to tax increment financing (TIF) districts in the USA.

A survey based on this approach was distributed to representatives of community redevelopment authorities (CRAs) in the State of Florida to ascertain practitioner feedback.

Although a majority of the respondents did not feel it was possible for political, economic and legal reasons, some did feel that it was a practical, reasonable and sustainable approach to financing projects for economic development. Some responses were correlated, with others indicating that certain beliefs framed their answers to the questions.

The surveys were only distributed to CRAs in the State of Florida. Future research will need to include other CRAs in other states to make the findings more generalizable. In addition, the results are merely descriptive and are not an assessment of a successful application.

The need for more development in blighted areas of many cities across the USA will put emphasis on innovative approaches in financing this. The growth of Islamic finance in the USA and the regulatory framework for it might open a doorway for its application in this area.

This is the first attempt to apply an Islamic financing methodology to local economic development in the USA, with practitioner feedback.

This article summarizes findings of a survey designed to obtain perceptions of municipal finance officers in Massachusetts regarding stabilization fund management strategies. Responses indicate that stabilization funds have become embedded components of municipal revenue management strategies, that municipalities are reluctant to tap stabilization fund balances, and that chief financial officers perceive these balances to be important to bond ratings. Some finance officers report active use of stabilization funds, generally because their communities either rely on the stabilization fund to finance capital projects or because they are currently vulnerable to revenue emergencies. A small number of communities report that they rely on voters to override statutory property tax levy limits, while maintaining stabilization fund balances above the statewide median.