Offshore taxpayer audits curbed

[Judi Lynn]

Source: New York Times

May 2, 2007, 11:10PM
Offshore taxpayer audits curbed
GAO says agents are afraid they can't meet deadlines on cases

By EDMUND L. ANDREWS
New York Times

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service is curtailing audits of many people who use offshore tax havens, even when agents see signs of tax evasion, because agents fear they cannot meet a three-year deadline for finishing an examination, congressional investigators have found.

In a report to be released today, the Government Accountability Office found IRS agents are so hobbled by "dilatory tactics" by offshore taxpayers and other problems that it takes almost 2 1/2 years to complete a typical audit.

Many IRS agents told the GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, that the "safest way" was often to stop an audit prematurely and sometimes to refrain from even starting one.

The IRS reported that almost $300 billion in investment and business income was moved out of the United States in 2003. Analysts at the Joint Committee on Taxation have estimated the annual outflow has shot to more than $400 billion since then.



Read more: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/4770563.html

[Hieronymus]

1. Good news for Haliburton.

[Spinzonner]

2. Simple solution

Force people to go live where their assets are, revoke their citizenship, and require them to get passports to enter the United States

[JCMach1]

5. Uhhh... no. I work and have assets overseas, but am not eligible for citizenship of that country

Would you have me be a man without a country?

Though we often don't like it, we live in a globalized world. The IRS needs to stop living in the 1950's.

[papau]

12. You "have assets overseas" like a US mutual fund owner? -or you flow asset & income

ownership and investment return through offshore legal entities so as to pay little tax?

It is the latter that requires a penalty that is other than being forced to hang with the GOP.

[JCMach1]

14. It matters little the result is the same... what is needed enforcement...

Bush is killing that leaving the loopholes wide open.

[papau]

15. the loophole exits only for the private investment as the 1940 act is obeyed and earnings reported -

the flow through loopholes of country definition of legal entity not in tune with US Law and IRS meanings, with multiple "partnership" to corporation to partnerships games with corresponding allocation of income to country are legal nonsense that is similar to the non-enforcement of IRS Code 482 but not the same.

The standard large large firm delay of 2 to 3 years for "clarification" and resistance to to response is a wealthy person game we have no laws against - hence a need for a worldwide asset tax for assets over $50,000,000 with offsets for assets taxes paid else where on those assets (the same worldwide approach that is used by the US now for corporate income).

While the non-enforcement of Section 482 of the IRS Code is indeed in need of change (the allocation of income to legal location of the source of income based on widget pricing rules and comp prices so as to find where the "value added" occurred and should be taxed), the lawyer world of the rich has gotten Bush's IRS to drop cases after 3 years, the delay by the lawyers draining IRS resources to the point the cases audited numbers drop, displeasing the GOP and Dems.

But simple buying of an EU market ETF or mutual fund has no tax fairness problems. Indeed actual investing overseas has no problem - tax wise fairness is easy and always achieved until the lawyers start to play games and drop income and tax into the ocean and into countries with no or minimal tax.

I gather from your answer that your lawyers have quoted the "it is not against the law to arrange ones affairs so as to pay the minimum tax" to you and you have done so - but the needed legal changes are near impossible to get by the lawyers/lobbyists for corporations/rich - so we may as well try for an asset tax.

[TheWatcher]

3. Anything Goes.

Criminals Are Running Completely Amok, and absolutely no one is going to stop them.

The average American though, strangely, still has to live by the rules that no longer seem to apply to these said Criminals.

What a sewer this country has become.

Shameful.

[Shallah Kali]

4. Taxes (and laws) are for the little people

the age of the robber baron returns

[ClintonTyree]

7. You've got that right.....

a good friend and I were discussing that point just the other day. The age of the robber barons has indeed returned, thanks to "The Decider's" policies and the policies of Republics since St.Reagan. :puke: Bastards! :grr:

[kimmylavin]

6. Well, tell you what...

It takes way too long for me to work all the hours I have to, just to pay my middle-class taxes, so in a pre-emptive move, I'm just not going to work anymore. Its the "safest way".


It takes almost 2 1/2 years to complete a typical audit? And this is when they see signs of tax evasion, and the numbers we're talking about are in the millions, if not the billions??? My friend ($24,000/year) got audited. It took them a few weeks to charge him almost 4 months' salary in back taxes. THAT case they can handle, and pursue aggressively, but not these cases? Sounds MIGHTY fishy to me...

[ClintonTyree]

8. The IRS has had to cut back....

on the number of auditors investigating the rich and have retasked them to investigate middle class taxpayers. As we all know it's the middle class taxpayer that's REALLY hurting the tax collections, NOT the big boys hiding billions in off-shore accounts. :sarcasm:

Besides, it's much easier to go after the little guys, all of their assets can fit on one single page of paper.

THANKS, IRS! :grr:

[november3rd]

9. What killed me ...

What killed me was the part where Andrews got down to the hard numbers:

The I.R.S. reported that almost $300 billion in investment and business income was moved out of the United States in 2003. Analysts at the Joint Committee on Taxation have estimated that the annual outflow has shot to more than $400 billion since then.

Then they soften it with some qualifying mumbo jumbo about how most of the money is in countries that have tax data sharing and disclosure agreements with the US, as if that's supposed to alleviate the capital drain on our economy.

Let's face it: it's no longer GOP sellout: it's out and out plundering of the USA to death!

Can anyone doubt that the Pentagon/White-House/GOP-Thinktank/Media axis is going to stop cadaverizing the good ol' USA? Not until they get what they want:

One globalized corporate/military facist state.

I think our brother antifaschits may be onto something after all: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x806909

Jesus Peace Love & Justice

[donkeyotay]

10. This reminds me of the response to the question, "Why do you rob banks?"

Because that's where the money is. Essentially, the IRS is saying that even though they know that the off-shore class is engaged in massive tax fraud, they'll continue to nickle and dime working stiffs because we're conveniently located and keep regular hours.

[Up2Late]

11. Funny how something like this happens when a Republican Congress keeps cutting the IRS Budget, huh?

But since the IRS is catching fewer Tax cheats, it must mean that the current "laws" are working, right? :banghead:

For those here who want to hide some money, :spray: here are some links I found the other night:

<http://www.worldoffshorebanks.com/Antilles(Netherlands).html>

<http://www.worldoffshorebanks.com/links.html>

<http://www.firstcaribbeanbank.an/>

<http://www.caribpro.com/Caribbean_Property_Magazine/index.php>

[truthisfreedom]

13. IF someone provided this sort of service to the "little people" we certainly would see the thugs up

in arms about it. BUT I can guarantee you that whatever action they took would leave ALL corporations completely free to do what they want to protec their money overseas.

[SOS]

16. Par for the course

Why investigate trillions of dollars hidden offshore by the wealthy for the purpose of tax evasion when they can spend their time harassing waitresses and cab drivers who might not have reported every single cash tip?