The taxation of imported fuel products: legal and economic issues of tackling vat and other import taxes fraud in the EU and Lithuanian Republic

The problem of tax fraud, in general, is widely recognized and discussed in the scientific literature, especially since 1960’s. Studies conducted by Becker (1968), Forte (1987), Johns and Slemrod (2010) reported that people with higher incomes are likely t o receive incomes from sources which are hard to monitor by tax authorities. Besides, the taxpayers learn how to invest in tax - free activities and how to (aggressively) plan taxes at the same time involving an organized crime even in the international cont ext (e.g. DiLorenzo, 2012). As Allingham and Sandmo (1972) show there are a lot of forms of tax fraud and therefore and they affect both direct and indirect taxes. In this context, tax fraud has a huge impact not only on state fiscal policy (Torgler and Sc haltegger, 2005) but also on honest taxpayers that face competitive disadvantage: these taxpayers can consider committing their own fraud to survive in the market.