Research on behavioural taxation

Dr. Michael Milde is the new interim professor for the Chair of Business Taxation at the Faculty of Business and Economics in the summer semester 2025.

He studied economics at the Leibniz University of Hannover, where he received his PhD in 2020 with a thesis on "Essays on the Effects of Deferred Taxation and Tax Audit Negotiations". He then spent five years as a post-doctoral researcher at the same time as heading the Laboratory for Experimental Economic Research.

His research focuses on behavioural taxation, i.e. the application of behavioural economic concepts to tax issues. This includes experimental analyses of tax economic decisions, the influence of tax frameworks on investment, financing and choice of legal form, and the interactions between tax planning and corporate sustainability goals. He also studies the behaviour of tax auditors, in particular their negotiation tactics, emotional reactions and effects on tax compliance.

Dr. Michael Milde's research has been published internationally in journals such as Management Science, Contemporary Accounting Research, Accounting, Organisations and Society and European Accounting Review.

In the summer semester, he teaches basic lectures on corporate taxation in the undergraduate and graduate programmes. The programme is complemented by a bachelor seminar on tax planning and tax impact theory and a PhD course on programming experiments with oTree.