THE IMPACT OF SOCIAL FACTORS ON INDIVIDUAL TAX COMPLIANCE

Abstract

Tax revenue is one of important government’s sources of revenue and the taxation system vary across countries. Malaysia went through the paradigm shift by employing the self-assessment system (SAS) on 2001 where responsibility of calculating taxes had shifted successfully from the Inland Revenue Board of Malaysia (IRBM) to taxpayers. Since then, the voluntary tax compliance through SAS in Malaysia has been paying a greater role in meeting the statutory tax obligations and collection, effectively and efficiently. The study is aimed to examine the ethical, moral, religious and cultural background considerations on individual voluntary tax compliance in Malaysia by engaging quantitative research approach by utilising 200 valid questionnaire from respondents who are the individual taxpayer in Malaysia. Multiple regression analysis conducted to identify the effect of ethicality, morality, religiosity and cultural background on the individual voluntary tax compliance in Malaysia. Findings shows that all the variables have significant positive relationship, however the multiple regression analysis proven that ethicality and religiosity have strong significant effect on the individual tax compliance behaviour and on the other hand, morality and cultural background doesn’t have significant effect on individual tax compliance behaviour.