Pamplin Media Group – The promulgation of ‘Big Brother’


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Instead of hiring thousands of IRS agents, the United States should work to eliminate offshore banks and tax havens

I was watching the debate on the enactment of the so-called “Build Back Better†infrastructure bill and heard one of the speakers talk about a provision that would fund the hiring of 87,000 IRS officers to audit. and monitor banking transaction activities. These positions would probably be from GS-07 to GS-09. A GS-07 employee starts at $ 38,050 to $ 49,467 and a GS-09 starts at $ 46,543 to $ 60,506.

So we have 87,000 times an average salary of $ 45,000 each year. You do the math. It would not be a one-time expense, but would become an annual expense.

These people should be paying for themselves by finding ways to charge those who file tax returns to check for underpayment of taxes. Thus, we might find ourselves spending a lot of time and effort trying to defend ourselves against these government claims for the additional taxes and associated penalties.

So why is this considered necessary? According to Janet Yellen, the US Secretary of the Treasury, we must catch tax evaders and raise funds to finance this bill which President Biden says will cost us nothing. Truly? You would think that if they really wanted to do something about tax evasion, they would tackle big fraud and maybe the segment of the banking industry that is designed to facilitate fraud, like Swiss banks and offshore banks.

If you look on the internet and read what Wikipedia has to say, you will find, “Switzerland has a long history of bank secrecy and customer privacy dating back to the early 1700s. Beginning as a means of protecting wealthy banking interests European, Swiss banks secrecy was codified in 1934 with the passage of the historic Federal Law, the Federal Law on Banks and Savings Banks. These laws, which were used to protect the assets of those persecuted by the Nazi authorities, have also been used by individuals and institutions seeking to illegally evade taxes, hide property or commit financial crimes in general. ”

The same article reads: “The Swiss Bankers Association (ASB) estimates that in 2018 Swiss banks held US $ 6.5 trillion, or 25% of all global cross-border assets.” Further, it is said: “In 2018, London-based Tax Justice Network ranked the Swiss banking sector as the ‘most corrupt’ in the world due to a large offshore banking sector and very strict secrecy laws. The ranking system attempts to measure how well the country’s legal system provides for money laundering and the protection of wealth obtained through corruption. ”

So what exactly is offshore banking? Offshore banking refers to the deposit of funds by a company or individual in a bank located outside of their national place of residence. While the term implies that these banks are located on islands, many offshore banks are actually located in onshore locations such as Panama, Luxembourg, and Switzerland.

The largest offshore banking operation is in the Cayman Islands. When I researched the Cayman Islands banking industry, I found the following: “There are a total of 212 open banks in this 264 square kilometer (approximately 102 square mile) Caribbean island. The Cayman Islands’ offshore financial institution is the sixth largest in the world, holding 6% of total global banking assets, or $ 1.7 trillion.

The same article says: “The whole offshore industry has long suffered from a rather shady reputation. Offshore sites, including the Cayman Islands, were seen as protectors of the wealthy and crooks. They cast a veil over it. ‘anonymity over the identity of their clients, protecting them from the scrutiny of the world. At the same time, they turn a blind eye to the less than legal sources of the assets in their banks. ”

It is interesting how these banks have developed an air of legitimacy, even though they are generally recognized as aiding and encouraging criminal activity.

Have you ever wondered why our governments, including the United Nations and other global organizations, have done nothing to eliminate these entities? What do you think we might find if you could open and examine the accounts and bunkers in the Swiss mountains that have been turned into huge safes? Do you think that one of the missing treasures that the Nazis accumulated during WWII might be there? And if they are, who owns them?

If governments did their job and weeded out these entities that facilitate tax evasion and money laundering, just think of the taxes they might collect if they got access to the huge volume of untaxed wealth flowing through. these banks. But if our lawmakers (national and international) don’t do this part of their job, maybe our national lawmakers would pass a flat tax that would apply to everyone equally, without all the deductions and loopholes. If they did, they wouldn’t need an additional army of IRS agents and might even reduce the number of agents they already employ.

John Bonham is a resident of Newberg.


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