As US Law Watch reports:
The Internal Revenue Service has assigned cases to agents for nearly all of the 15,000 taxpayers who came in under the special program to allow voluntary disclosures of offshore assets that ended last October, and expects a significant number of cases to be closed by the end of the calendar year, senior IRS officials said May 8.
As ever, you can be sure that's the tip of the iceberg.
And as ever it proves these things.
First, offshore tax evasion is as serious as I and others claim it to be.
Second, it can only take place because vast numbers of people in secrecy jurisdictions turn a blind eye to it, very deliberately and very knowingly.
Third, more action is needed to tackle it.
Fourth, the case for more transparency is made, yet again.
Fifth, automatic information exchange is essential.
But still the lawyers, accountants and bankers argue for secrecy.
Could it be that's because they're making money from this illegality?
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“And as ever it proves these things.
First, offshore tax evasion is as serious as I and others claim it to be.”
How does it prove this point?
On the scale of the UK, whose population is 20% of the US, and whose economy is 12-15 times smaller, that would equate to somewhere between 1,000 to 3,000 offshore evaders coming forard.
This is pathetic; if anything, it demonstrates how this issue is blown completely out of proportion by serial distorters with painfully obvious political motivations.
Time to cut your losses and run, I’d say.
@Ted G
I guarantee you wouldn’t say that of 3,000 benefit frauds
Or 3,000 shop lifters
And each of them will steal pennies
Offshore costs tens of billions
But you apologise for it
Why is that?
Do you make money from crime?
Personally I do not care much about shoplifters or benefit cheats. They are just one more nuisance of modern life, but that is it. However, I am not aware that shoplifters and benefit cheats receive the full-time attention of a Senator, who himself comes from the benefit-cheating capital of the nation. That really annoys me.
Having clarified this, could you help me with the mathematics: how can 15,000 people (or 1,000 to 3,000 for the UK) cause tens of billions of Dollars of revenue losses? If the loss amounts to say $50 billion, these evaders would each be hiding $3 million per annum. This just makes NO sense.
@Ted G
What was unclear about “tip of an iceberg”?
Looks like this iceberg is about the size of an ice cube in a cocktail glass.
@Ted G
I can’t imagine the size of your cocktails
Phone AA, I suggest