It's Guaranteed

     As the old saying goes, death and taxes are the only two guarantees in life! Personally I believe there is also a third, it is guaranteed that people will cheat on their taxes. With tax season underway another year of fraud, evasion and identity theft begins. Unfortunately there have been taxes since the beginning of time and they are never pleasant. Whenever people have to give up their money or belongings there will also be those who attempt to avoid it. The increase in these crimes can be attributed to a large out of touch Federal Government. Does that mean I am blaming the government for citizen tax fraud? OK maybe only half the blame, the U.S Federal Government is currently unaffordable in size and growth. It is no secret that the United States is 17 trillion dollars in debt, this is an astonishing number that will never be paid off. I understand why people are hesitant to give more money to this irresponsible and out of touch entity. American taxpayers have no assurance that their hard earned money is being spent the way they are told, and the government is too big to give such assurances. The bottom line is that people don't trust the government and especially not the IRS. The IRS is currently in the middle of a class action lawsuit filed by a number of conservative organizations that claim they were illegally targeted for auditing. It is very troubling when Federal power is used to frustrate and silence political opponents, aren't we supposed to be living in a civil society? Don't get me wrong, I am in no way trying to justify cheating on your taxes. Most of the fraud that goes on is probably done by criminals who don't want to do things the honest way and are looking for the easy money. However, in my opinion it is probably much easier to justify the crime when you are so distant and disconnected from the government to begin with. I think both parties are to blame in this mess. Tax fraud in the United States is a huge problem that won't change anytime soon. For the 2011 tax season the IRS identified approximately 1.5 million undetected tax returns with potentially fraudulent tax refunds totaling in excess of $5.2 billion. In 2010 the total financial loss attributed to identity theft totaled $13.2 billion. These numbers continues to grow every year. These are mind boggling amounts of money. -BDB

Sources- (Google Images)
http://www.statisticbrain.com/identity-theft-fraud-statistics/

http://www.treasury.gov/tigta/auditreports/2012reports/201242080fr.html