TITLE: What is $1^k+2^k+\cdots+ (p-1)^k$ modulo $p$? (From Ireland and Rosen).
QUESTION [9 upvotes]: I've been working through a bit of Ireland and Rosen's Number Theory for fun. Problem 4.11 of Ireland and Rosen asks

Prove that $1^k+2^k+\cdots+(p-1)^k\equiv 0\pmod{p}$ if $p-1\nmid k$, and $-1\pmod{p}$ if $p-1\mid k$. 

My work is leading where I didn't expect to go. Here I assume $p$ id odd. First, if $p-1\mid k$, then we can wrike $k=(p-1)j$ for some $j$. But then
$$
1^k+\cdots+(p-1)^k\equiv 1^{(p-1)j}+\cdots+(p-1)^{(p-1)j}\equiv \underbrace{1+\cdots+1}_{p-1\text{ times}}=\frac{(p-1)p}{2}\equiv 0\pmod{p}
$$
since $p-1$ is even. 
Secondly, I suppose $p-1\nmid k$. WLOG, I can assume $0<k<p-1$, Since if $k=(p-1)j+r$ with $0<r<p-1$, then 
$$
a^k\equiv a^{(p-1)j+r}\equiv a^r\pmod{p}.
$$
Then if $g$ is a primitive root,
$$
1^k+\cdots+(p-1)^k=\sum_{i=1}^{p-1}(g^k)^i=\frac{g^k(1-g^{k(p-1)})}{1-g^k}.
$$
Since $g$ is primitive, $p\nmid 1-g^k$, but $p\mid 1-g^{k(p-1)}$, so the above sum is again congruent to $0\pmod{p}$.
So in all cases, I get the sum is congruent to $0$ regardless. Have I messed up, or is there a typo? Thanks.

REPLY [9 votes]: Let $g$ be a primitive root of $p$. Then $2,3,\dots,p-1$ are congruent, in some order, to $g,g^2, \dots,g^{p-2}$.  
Thus our sum $S_k$ is congruent to 
$$1+g^{k}+g^{2k}+\cdots +g^{(p-2)k}\tag{$1$}$$
modulo $p$.
If $p-1$ divides $k$, then by Fermat's Theorem each term is congruent to $1$ modulo $p$. There are $p-1$ terms, so the sum is congruent to $-1$ modulo $p$.
Now suppose that $p-1$ does not divide $k$. Multiplying expression $(1)$ by $1-g^k$, we obtain
$$(1-g^k)S_k\equiv 1-g^{(p-1)k}\equiv 0\pmod{p}.$$
Since $p-1$ does not divide $k$, and $g$ has order $p-1$, it follows that $1-g^k\not\equiv 0\pmod{p}$. It follows that $S_k\equiv 0\pmod{p}$.