Taxation Income, Graft and Informal Sector Operations in Nigeria in Relation to Other African Countries

Abstract

This study investigates the influence of the informal sector and graft on income accruing to the government through taxation in Nigeria. Informal economy and graft are the two critical activities that inhibit government tax revenue collection and negatively affect the performance of an effective government. The study employs secondary data that cover a period from 2000 to 2018.This period is the millennium period which the country is expected to overcome corruption and curtail the level of informal economic activities prevailing in the nation, but it appears that all efforts seem not to be yielding the required results. In order to achieve the objective of this study, the multi-regression analysis is performed and the results indicate that corruption is very harmful to tax revenue collection while the informal economy has no significant impact on tax revenue within the millennium period covered by this study. Thus, the study suggests formalization of legal unofficial economy activities and total eradication of corruption in Nigeria through the strengthening of the anti-graft agencies, reinforcement of the legal structure and introduction of a more severe penalty for the perpetrators.