Promoting the digital transformation of enterprises is an important method and foothold to realize the development of the digital economy. For enterprises, digital transformation not only changes the information environment and subverts the traditional governance model, but also has a profound impact on their behavior and decision-making. Existing studies affirm the positive effect of digital transformation from the perspective of promoting the quality and efficiency of real enterprises and high-quality economic development, while few literatures pay attention to whether digital transformation can play a role in improving income distribution.

In view of this, this paper attempts to provide an answer from the perspective of corporate taxation, which is an important source of national tax revenue. Tax evasion by enterprises not only affects the normal tax order and inhibits the regulation function of tax on national income distribution, but also hinders the realization of the goal of common prosperity. Therefore, studying the economic consequences of digital transformation from the perspective of corporate taxation will help to reveal the effectiveness of digital transformation in promoting the fair distribution of national income and promoting the realization of common prosperity.

Based on the annual report of Chinese A-share listed companies from 2010 to 2021, this paper uses the COM-B behavior decision theory to study the impact of digital transformation on corporate tax compliance. The results show that: First, digital transformation significantly improves corporate tax compliance. Second, digital transformation can restrain the ability of tax aggressiveness by improving information transparency and information transmission efficiency (information channel), reduce the opportunity for tax aggressiveness by enhancing the effectiveness of internal control (governance channel), reduce the motivation of tax aggressiveness by improving the level of cash flow and financing ability (resource channel), and then promote corporate tax compliance. Third, in the context of lower external audit quality, higher management power, and lower regional bank competition, the positive impact of digital transformation on corporate tax compliance is more significant. Fourth, the superior digital financial environment and strong tax enforcement are important external conditions for digital transformation to improve corporate tax compliance.

This paper makes the following contributions: On the one hand, the in-depth exploration of the economic consequences of digital transformation is conducive to summing up the successful experience of the integration of digital technology and real enterprises. This paper takes corporate tax compliance as an entry point, providing new evidence for the economic consequences of digital transformation. It enriches the research on the economic consequences of digital transformation and the influencing factors of corporate tax compliance. On the other hand, it provides a feasible method for regulating corporate tax decision-making and enhancing national financial resources. The conclusions indicate that using digital technology to enhance the capacity of national tax absorption is a feasible method, which can help to extract and promote it to other developing countries, and contribute “Chinese wisdom” to global tax governance.