Tag Archives: lay/shares
Fraud, fish, and the blind IRS
October 15, 2012
National
Remember the LA Times story, “the fisherman and the tax man” (5/30/10) about fishermen seeking, and being denied, disaster relief after the BP oil spill? “I worked for an uncle last year who paid me in cash. The BP guy wanted my tax statements, but how can I pay taxes if everything I earned was in cash?” How did the IRS answer that question? Did it examine boat owner records, find any reporting violations, any evidence of worker misclassification, the focus of the White House Task Force on the Middle Class that same year? No. The story isn’t that some bayou deck hands don’t pay taxes, the real story is that the IRS doesn’t enforce the tax laws in the fishing industry……….Read More
