The identification of factors influencing value-added tax revenue performance in Cambodia

Abstract

This research investigated the direct effect of a VAT audit, tax education, tax resource, and tax rate on tax revenue performance, including the indirect impact of tax resources on tax revenue performance through VAT audit or tax education. In this study, five latent variables were predicted by twenty reliable manifest variables as referring to confirmatory factor analysis. We analyzed causal relationships among latent constructs based on the structural equation model. The estimation of sample parameters and statistical tests for hypotheses testing of the direct effect of all latent variables on tax resource performance were performed under the maximum likelihood estimation method. From this method, the estimated sample parameters were 0.103 for VAT audit, 0.161 for tax education, 0.014 for tax rate, and 0.583 for tax resource. These variables had a direct statistically significant effect on tax resource performance. The estimation standard errors for the indirect effect hypotheses testing were developed under the maximum likelihood method and bootstrapping technique. The test results indicated that tax resources positively affected tax revenue performance through the mediation of VAT audit or tax education. Tax resources played the most critical latent variable in explaining tax revenue performance.