Returns the ATO's annual Tax Gap publication: estimates of the difference between the tax theoretically payable under current law and the tax actually collected, across each tax type and taxpayer population (individuals not in business, small business, large corporate, GST, excise, fuel tax credits, PRRT, superannuation guarantee).
Value
An ato_tbl. Tax-gap estimates are in nominal AUD
millions of the reporting year and typically accompanied by
a percentage-gap column.
Details
The Tax Gap series is used by Treasury (every MYEFO), the Parliamentary Budget Office, and academic researchers as the headline measure of revenue integrity.
References
Australian Taxation Office (annual). Australian tax gaps – overview. Methodology notes on bottom-up, top-down, and random-inquiry approaches to the tax-gap estimation.
HMRC (annual). Measuring tax gaps. Sister methodology paper applied by HM Revenue and Customs in the UK; the ATO series was partly inspired by this literature.
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (2017). Shining Light on the Shadow Economy: Opportunities and Threats. Paris. Synthesises tax-gap measurement practice across OECD member countries.
See also
Other discovery:
ato_catalog(),
ato_charities(),
ato_cite(),
ato_download(),
ato_excise(),
ato_fbt(),
ato_help(),
ato_irpd(),
ato_payg(),
ato_rdti(),
ato_sme_benchmarks(),
ato_top_taxpayers(),
ato_vttc()
Examples
# \donttest{
op <- options(ato.cache_dir = tempdir())
try({
gaps <- ato_tax_gaps()
head(gaps)
})
#> ℹ Downloading <https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/f627f458-7d5a-450d-9f62-45d6983…
#> Waiting 2s for throttling delay ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■
#> Waiting 2s for throttling delay ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■
#> ℹ Downloading <https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/f627f458-7d5a-450d-9f62-45d6983…
#> ✔ Downloading <https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/f627f458-7d5a-450d-9f62-45d6983…
#>
#> # ato_tbl: ATO Tax Gaps (sheet: 1)
#> # Source: https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/f627f458-7d5a-450d-9f62-45d6983961da/resource/59a43b92-26d9-451e-822a-ab437f5a4742/download/australian-tax-gaps-2025-publication.xlsx
#> # Licence: CC BY 2.5 AU
#> # Retrieved: 2026-08-23 17:36 UTC
#> # SHA-256: 107fd0e9e1e0b9e0...
#> # Rows: 6 Cols: 25
#>
#> program_population program_type tax_type data_type
#> 1 Alcohol Transactional Alcohol Excise (Beer only) Main
#> 2 Alcohol Transactional Alcohol Excise (Beer only) Main
#> 3 Alcohol Transactional Alcohol Excise (Beer only) Main
#> 4 Alcohol Transactional Alcohol Excise (Beer only) Main
#> 5 Alcohol Excise Transactional Indirect Excise Main
#> 6 Alcohol Excise Transactional Indirect Excise Main
#> publish_year reliability financial_year population theoretical_liability_m
#> 1 2015 Low 2008-09 NA 2500.000
#> 2 2015 Low 2009-10 NA 2000.000
#> 3 2015 Low 2010-11 NA 2000.000
#> 4 2015 Low 2011-12 NA 2000.000
#> 5 2020 Medium (16) 2015-16 6116 5936.183
#> 6 2020 Medium (16) 2016-17 6313 5932.585
#> assured_amount_m voluntary_amounts_m amendments_m net_gap_m
#> 1 NA 2495.000 NA 5.000
#> 2 NA 1990.000 NA 10.000
#> 3 NA 1980.000 NA 20.000
#> 4 NA 1980.000 NA 20.000
#> 5 NA 5367.742 3.258 565.183
#> 6 NA 5360.711 3.489 568.385
#> unreported_amount_m non_detection_m non_pursuable_debt_m gross_gap net_gap
#> 1 NA NA NA NA 0.002
#> 2 NA NA NA NA 0.005
#> 3 NA NA NA NA 0.010
#> 4 NA NA NA NA 0.010
#> 5 562.183 NA 3.0 0.096 0.095
#> 6 566.585 NA 1.8 0.096 0.096
#> voluntary_performance overall_performance tax_expected_to_be_collected_m
#> 1 0.998 0.998 NA
#> 2 0.995 0.995 NA
#> 3 0.990 0.990 NA
#> 4 0.990 0.990 NA
#> 5 0.904 0.905 NA
#> 6 0.904 0.904 NA
#> gross_gap_m shadow_economy_m tax_impact_of_hidden_wages_ind_gap_m
#> 1 NA NA NA
#> 2 NA NA NA
#> 3 NA NA NA
#> 4 NA NA NA
#> 5 NA NA NA
#> 6 NA NA NA
#> tax_impact_of_hidden_wages_sb_gap_m
#> 1 NA
#> 2 NA
#> 3 NA
#> 4 NA
#> 5 NA
#> 6 NA
options(op)
# }