Tax Salience, Escrow, and Support for Property Tax: Findings from a Survey of South Carolina Voters

Authors

Susan Young, University of South Carolina-Aiken
Matthew P. Thornburg, University of South Carolina-Aiken
David Wilson Steinmeyer, University of South Carolina-Aiken

Volume Number

50

Issue Number

1

Abstract

Tax salience has been found to impact tax opposition attitudes in a previous study, and scholars find that tax presentation is a key factor influencing the salience of a tax to those who pay it. We test Cabral and Hoxby’s 2012 hypothesis that homeowners who escrow their property tax payments will express more support for property tax increases than non-escrow taxpayers. Using original data collected from a mailed survey of South Carolina voters our multi-variate regression analysis shows that homeowners who escrow property taxes express more support for increasing school tax than do non-escrow payers. We also find significant knowledge limits among respondents in understanding the actual school tax costs on taxpayers in South Carolina. Most S.C. homeowners are exempt from paying property taxes for school operations, but this is not widely understood according to our findings.

Recommended Citation

Young, Susan; Thornburg, Matthew P.; and Steinmeyer, David Wilson (2022) "Tax Salience, Escrow, and Support for Property Tax: Findings from a Survey of South Carolina Voters," Journal of Political Science: Vol. 50: No. 1, Article 4.
Available at: https://digitalcommons.coastal.edu/jops/vol50/iss1/4