Meir Statman : How Not to Hate Doing Your Taxes : Bloomberg
Meir Statman, Glenn Klimek Professor of Finance, was one of the experts in behavioral finance and economics interviewed in a piece for Bloomberg which questioned what could be done to make filing your taxes a less dreadful chore. Many of the experts shared useful perspective changes or potential accolades which could incentivize paying taxes in a timely and efficient manner.
An excerpt from the piece:
You can make people feel better about paying taxes by showing them the government is handling their money responsibly, said Meir Statman, a behavioral finance professor at Santa Clara University. "Money can go to Medicare, but is it used efficiently to improve health at low cost?" he asked. "Money can go to the Department of Labor, but is it used efficiently to enact and enforce regulations, such as fiduciary regulations, that help people increase their retirement savings?"
Still, he acknowledged, that’s a tall order. You could just play shamelessly to Americans' love of status. For example, the IRS building could be renamed each year after the person who paid the most in taxes, he said, as when corporations buy the naming rights to sports arenas. (What about when a businessman is paid to put his name on a building?)
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