Subordinate or Entitled Partner? The Effects of Taxpayer News on Political Trust and Demands for Government Accountability

Abstract

This study explores the effects of tax-related news on government accountability in the United States. When exposed to news that framed the taxpayer as the ultimate sponsor of public spending to whom the government is accountable, people reacted indistinguishably from those who read no tax news. However, when exposed to identically valenced news that framed the taxpayer in procedural terms of tax collection, they responded with higher accountability demands. This suggests that in contexts where citizens are socialized into taxpayer-entitling discourse, this perspective can become the default framework, leading citizens to claim oversight rights when denied this discursively privileged position.

Keywords:

• Democratization
• Framing
• Government Accountability
• News Discourse
• Political Trust
• Taxation
• Taxpayer Discourse

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank Rachel Young, Melissa Tully, William Reisinger, Frank Durham and Julianna Pacheco for their insightful comments at various stages of this project.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the University of Iowa School of Journalism and Mass Communication under the Murray Research Grant, the University of Iowa Graduate College Summer Fellowship, and the University of Iowa Graduate and Professional Student Government Research Grant.

Notes on contributors

Volha Kananovich

Volha Kananovich (Ph.D., The University of Iowa) is an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Appalachian State University. Her research examines the role of political and media discourse in (de)legitimizing various forms of politically meaningful citizen engagement with the state. Her work has been published in The International Journal of Press/Politics, the Atlantic Journal of Communication, Journalism Studies, and The International Journal of Communication, among other publications