|
Under the federal law of the United States of America, tax evasion or tax fraud, is the purposeful illegal attempt of a taxpayer to evade payment of a tax imposed by the federal government. Conviction of tax evasion may result in fines and imprisonment.〔26 U.S.C. § 7201.〕 Tax evasion is separate from "tax avoidance", which is the legal utilization of the tax regime to one's own advantage in order to reduce the amount of tax that is payable by means that are within the law. Tax evasion is illegal while tax avoidance is legal. In ''Gregory v. Helvering'' the US Supreme Court concurred with Judge Learned Hand's statement that: "Any one may so arrange his affairs that his taxes shall be as low as possible; he is not bound to choose that pattern which will best pay the Treasury; there is not even a patriotic duty to increase one's taxes." However, the court also ruled there was a duty not to illegally distort the tax code so as to evade paying one's legally required tax burden.〔''Helvering v. Gregory'', 69 F.2d 809, 810 (2d Cir. 1934), ''aff'd'', 293 U.S. 465, 55 S.Ct. 266, 79 L.Ed. 596 (1935).〕 == Occurrence == The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has identified small business and sole proprietorship employees as the largest contributors to the tax gap between what Americans owe in federal taxes and what the federal government receives. Rather than W-2 wage earners and corporations, small business and sole proprietorship employees contribute to the tax gap because there are few ways for the government to know about skimming or non-reporting of income without mounting more significant investigations. When tips, side-jobs, cash receipts, and barter income is not reported it is illegal cheating because no tax is paid by individuals. Similarly, those who are self-employed or run small businesses may not declare income and evade the payment of taxes. The typical tax evader in the United States is a male under the age of 50 in the highest tax bracket and with a complicated return, and the most common means of tax evasion is overstatement of charitable contributions, particularly church donations.〔Patricia Sabatini, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, "Tax Cheats Cost U.S. hundreds of billions," http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07084/772106-28.stm〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Tax evasion in the United States」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|