<story><title>The Golden Age of Rich People Not Paying Their Taxes</title><url>http://theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/12/rich-people-are-getting-away-not-paying-their-taxes/577798/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>theandrewbailey</author><text>&amp;gt; &amp;quot;No business would fail to fund a unit that, on average, brought in $7 for every dollar spent. Shareholders would rebel and bring lawsuits, or at least oust the management or board of directors,&amp;quot; Olson wrote in her preface to the report. &amp;quot;Yet this is precisely what we are doing with the IRS budget.&amp;quot;[0]&lt;p&gt;Sounds like the IRS should be the most funded government agency.&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.irs.gov&amp;#x2F;newsroom&amp;#x2F;national-taxpayer-advocate-delivers-annual-report-to-congress-focuses-on-tax-reform-irs-funding-and-identity-theft&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.irs.gov&amp;#x2F;newsroom&amp;#x2F;national-taxpayer-advocate-deli...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>anonymouzz</author><text>Yeah, especially because tax avoidance is an insanely difficult problem to fight once it gets big enough. I mean it&amp;#x27;s impossible to prosecute at once even 10% of the country for not paying taxes.&lt;p&gt;Imagine the US going through a Greece episode, which was caused in big part by tax avoidance. To this day it&amp;#x27;s perfectly fine in Greece to ask for a ~20% &amp;quot;cash discount&amp;quot; in almost any shop, which of course means simply not paying the VAT tax (similar to the US sales tax).&lt;p&gt;Edit: let me self-correct - this does not seem to be an actual problem in the US - with this plot:
&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.m.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Tax_evasion#Government_response&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.m.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Tax_evasion#Government_respo...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>The Golden Age of Rich People Not Paying Their Taxes</title><url>http://theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/12/rich-people-are-getting-away-not-paying-their-taxes/577798/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>theandrewbailey</author><text>&amp;gt; &amp;quot;No business would fail to fund a unit that, on average, brought in $7 for every dollar spent. Shareholders would rebel and bring lawsuits, or at least oust the management or board of directors,&amp;quot; Olson wrote in her preface to the report. &amp;quot;Yet this is precisely what we are doing with the IRS budget.&amp;quot;[0]&lt;p&gt;Sounds like the IRS should be the most funded government agency.&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.irs.gov&amp;#x2F;newsroom&amp;#x2F;national-taxpayer-advocate-delivers-annual-report-to-congress-focuses-on-tax-reform-irs-funding-and-identity-theft&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.irs.gov&amp;#x2F;newsroom&amp;#x2F;national-taxpayer-advocate-deli...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jandrese</author><text>It has diminishing returns, but right now the budget is still on the steep part of the graph so funding it makes a lot of sense unless you&amp;#x27;re a tax cheat.</text></comment>