So why would illegals pay taxes on money received under the table?

[cantstandbush]

i couldn't help wondering why this lie continues to circulate to support the case for illegals staying in this country because they help the economy so much by paying taxes and by not burdening the social service systems. Every person that I know (6) who employ illegals as either nannies or domestics pay them in cash and report nothing. The day workers standing around the local 7-11 are picked up and paide wages after their jobs are completed and none of them pay taxes. And certainly the corporations who use most of them do not pay any benefits for them

[Atman]

1. Shhhh!

Stop asking questions!

[babylonsister]

2. They help support this economy and pay taxes to do so. nt

[Berserker]

20. They help support this economy and pay taxes to do so??

Analysis of the latest Census data indicates that California's illegal immigrant population is costing the state's taxpayers more than $10.5 billion per year for education, medical care and incarceration. Even if the estimated tax contributions of illegal immigrant workers are subtracted, net outlays still amount to nearly $9 billion per year. The annual fiscal burden from those three areas of state expenditures amounts to about $1,183 per household headed by a native-born resident.
http://www.fairus.org/site/PageServer?pagename=iic_immigrationissuecentersffec

[babylonsister]

26. I was referring to consumer goods, which we all pay taxes on. nt

[converted_democrat]

28. They contribute a lot to SS..

There is $519 billion suspence file-

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2006/02/ss_secret_stash.html
This passage is halfway down the page under Roadblock..

The usage of fake or stolen Social Security numbers for illegal immigrants would seem to be an issue of national concern. However, solving the problem is even more difficult than tracking the causes.

The Social Security Administration counts its total intake -- including monies placed in the suspense file -- for its earnings reports.

If the undocumented workers using fake SSNs suddenly started claiming the benefits they were due, the total Social Security surplus would have to be recalculated, leading to a greater possibility of the fund drying up.


Edited for my grammar issues..

[Bridget Burke]

29. FAIR is anti-immigration....

And the Scaife family supplies much of its funding.

www.mediatransparency.org/recipientgrants.php?recipientID=1162

[cantstandbush]

30. "Estimated tax cotributions of illegal immigrant workers?"

Surely you are not talking about Income taxes. That's the tax I am talking about. They simply don't pay it...no penalties, no taxes.

[TahitiNut]

34. So do tourists.

:shrug:

[bullimiami]

3. sales tax, gas tax, tax on utilities and so on and so on.

you forget these exist but the less you make, the higher percentage of your income they suck up.

[BlooInBloo]

5. And before anyone bitches about "skating" on income taxes...

... it should be pointed out that a citizen making as little as they do wouldn't owe any income taxes ANYWAY. So they're skating free on income taxes IN NAME ONLY.

[Richard Steele]

24. Bingo. If they could file a tax return, they would get money BACK.

With almost every financial transaction subject to some form of taxation,
the average "illegal" worker in the USA is paying a HIGHER PERCENTAGE
of their income in TAXES than the citizen who makes 100 thou a year.

[Berserker]

33. I call bullshit

We are not talking about mowing lawns and picking fruit here. I am talking about construction workers installing sheetrock, Roofing , Siding and other trades. There are crews of illegals doing this work and making damn good money. They do not pay taxes,Social security, Workman's Comp or have a Contractors Lic. How do other contractors compete with that?
I read so many posts saying how low of a wage they work for and the people that say this have NO CLUE of what they are talking about.

[ellenfl]

8. so they don't VOLUNTARILY pay taxes as all the talking heads

are making it sound like they do. also, those taxes they DO pay basically benefit local government, not federal.

ellen fl

[BlooInBloo]

12. Was too late I guess....

:rofl:

[ellenfl]

4. i have wondered about the taxpaying thing as well.

how can illegals pay taxes since none have social security cards? the only tax i see them paying is sales tax.

ellen fl

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

6. That's a helluva good argument for amnesty.

[BlooInBloo]

10. ROFL! Not for a "republican" it isn't!

LOL! I can see it now - republicans campaigning to illegal aliens: "They want to raise your taxes by making you citizens! If you were on our side, we'd keep your taxes lower, by keeping you illegal!"

:rofl:

[pagam]

7. some do

They use fake social security numbers, fake alien cards. there is a black market for this type of thing.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, not all immigrants cross the border. They arrive to the US with temporary visas and just stay.

[HamdenRice]

9. It's in the employer's interest to make aliens pay taxes accounting wise

Consider a construction contractor who hires illegal aliens. If he pays cash to the workers, and the employment is completely under the table, then he bears the whole cost of the wage.

If he employs the worker officially and pretends he doesn't know that the worker is illegal, then he gets to deduct the wage he pays from his revenue as a cost of doing business. This reduces his tax burden. It is as thought the government picks up anywhere between 25% and 50% of the cost of the wage, depending on the business tax bracket of the employer.

So employers almost all pay illegals over the table, and report the payments as a cost of doing business on their own business taxes.

But that means that they also have to withhold income and payroll taxes from the illegal aliens' paycheck. Many of these aliens would be eligible for refunds or even tax credits, but because they are afraid to file they simply leave the taxes with the governments -- under phantom social security numbers. Many also never receive social security when they retire for the same reasons.

That's why illegal aliens tend to pay more income and payroll taxes for their tax brackets compared to legal aliens and citizens.

The people who don't withhold taxes from aliens paychecks are employers who are not businesses -- families paying baby sitters or nannies, or homeowners paying gardeners -- because their payments to the alien are not deductible from their own taxes.

[vi5]

11. What I want to know is...

How can they use the tax based services and systems (welfare, medicare, public schools, etc.) if they are not legal? Don't you need a social security number to use those services?

Or am I being naive and it's easy to get a fake SS #?

[Finder]

17. Public schools are paid for by property taxes...

and is usually part of the rent paid to landlords who pay the property taxes.

[DUHandle]

13. Children who baby sit and Men who process dead deer.

Also do not pay taxes as a rule.

[WilmywoodNCparalegal]

14. About using fake documents

Sure, you may pay taxes with a fake SSN and your employer may not have verified the veracity of the document and may pay social security, medicare, etc., but using a fake document, regardless of the reason, is not exactly legal.

In fact, to obtain something as a result of using the fake document is fraud and it could also be identity theft, if that number belongs to someone.

My husband had the unpleasant news at the DMV in NC when he renewed his driver's license that someone else was using his social security number and that the number was being used by someone employed in NC's many poultry farms.

[Finder]

18. Deadbeat dads do this to evade garnishing of wages. n/t

[BlooInBloo]

27. Wow. That's a step beyond 'deadbeat', imo...

"deadbeat" connotes passivity, just not doing anything. Falsifying docs is an ACTIVE step, which in my non-legal mind bumps it up a notch to full on fraud, or some such thing...

[Finder]

15. That is the problem with the term...

everybody bases it on their own understanding rather than fact. Generalizing tends to confuse the issue.

Many of the "illegals" use fake papers, SS numbers. Many are married to US citizens and have children. They have jobs where taxes are taken out, pay sales tax for anything purchased, pay excise tax, etc...

There are those who get paid under the table or work as contracted day laborers(even citizens do not pay taxes until they have earned 600.00) and although they do not pay payroll taxes, they pay sales tax on goods purchased like anyone else.

You cannot live in the US without being a "taxpayer" the way the system is set up.

[RaleighNCDUer]

16. There's taxes and there's taxes.

If they are using a fake SSN, the taxes are deducted, but nobody can claim on those deductions, so the government keeps them.

Also, federal taxes are only a part of all taxes anyone pays. They pay their local taxes in sales taxes, user fees, etc.

They may not be paying their fair share of taxes, but then they aren't exactly getting a fair share of the benefits, either -- they won't have any social security or medicare, and if someone commits a crime against them they don't dare call the police for fear that they will themselves be arrested.

No matter how you cut it, when you are illegal and being paid minimum wage or less, you are NOT living high on the hog, scamming the rest of us.

Would YOU trade places with them, so save a bit on your taxes?

[2Design]

19. fake social security numbers - they buy the numbers

not sure if they are legit or not - but that money goes to government

we are all immigrants
this is the old divide and conquer
the enemy is the government and corporations - not the workers
they are trying to live and survive on this planet

the lines between countries are arbitrary - this is like the berlin wall - take down the boundaries - let all people live where they want - work where they want - and let us take up the best practices - health care for all -

no taking someones house because they became ill
no more homeless

if this was a truly christian country - we would not have people living on the street or in poverty

this government is very ill - and has failed the people

[mzteris]

21. illegals with "documentation"

pay taxes, but they never get refunds as they don't "file", and can rarely get any type of social services due to the level of scrutiny.

Also - they pay "sales taxes" on everything they buy. They purchase food and services and gas and clothes . . .

[fleabert]

22. that assertion comes from the fact that many companies hire

workers with fake identification, with I9's and W4's to go with them. Taxes are paid to the government from those workers.

I have personal knowledge of this being true.

Employers are not trained to spot fake documents, and the gov't doesn't check up on it. The SS benefits alone are huge. they are deducted but never claimed- because the person on the paperwork doesn't exist.

on edit: also, the 'taxes' many refer to would be sales tax. any item purchased by the worker is taxed.

[Cleita]

23. Look at your facts. Very few are paid under the table.

Most employers, restaurants, hotels and gardening contractors will not risk getting the IRS on their backs by not reporting wages. Day workers across the board don't pay taxes no matter what their ethnicity. I used to know a bunch of caddies from the nearby country club, all legal Americans who were paid by the day and never filed taxes, so brown, Spanish speaking guys aren't the only guilty parties.

You must be very well off to know so many people who have domestics. If so, the law states they have to take Social Security out of their wages and send it into the IRS. If your rich friends aren't doing this then you should report them to the IRS. Considering too that those domestics who aren't having FICA taken out of their wages usually only get room and board and very little cash, like the minimum wage legally required. Even if they filed they probably wouldn't owe taxes on their slave labor wages.

[cantstandbush]

32. The people I know are my children's employers. My family is not rich.

We are a working family trying to make ends meet on depressed wages and little benefits. A nd I do know "day workers" whose income is twice that of my daughter who has been a teacher for 3 years. And the "day worker" pays no taxes. She works and farms out a cadre of day workers to other jobs and takes a percentage of their wages. Very enterprising and that fits with our capitalist system but the person still pays on income taxes and my daughter does on half the earnings.

[FlaGranny]

25. In my entire life, I've known

very few people who will pay "under the table." Employers lose a huge tax deduction for the salary paid to each employee. It doesn't make a lot of sense.

When we had a few employees, we deducted their taxes and paid their SS. There was no way we wanted to pay taxes on the income we earned through their labor. The only reason to pay under the table would be that the employer was not reporting his income.

[hedgehog]

31. As noted above, the federal government is making money off

these people. State and local governments may (I repeat may) be taking a hit since they provide needed services such as schools, hospitals, medical care, housing, etc. It's a little more of the old wink, wink, nudge, nudge system.

Why haven't we ever admitted the obvious and set a higher quota for Mexican and Canadian immigrants with a secondary quota for South Americans and then a quota for the rest of the world?