tax fraud?

[Gwenyhfair]

I don´t know where to put this. A person I know is maybe committing tax fraud. I actually have suspected her for a long time, because she bought this very expensive apartment. But I thought she was my friend and maybe she really had declared all that income. We knew each other at school and i know there´s definitely no inheritance to mention. She always complained about being poor.

Well our friendship has slowly been dying. And I suddnly realised there has not been anything you could really call friendship for years, if ever.

Then this thing happened. She had left some bills and bank statements so that I could easily see them. I did not have to dig or break in to her safe or anything. They just lied there. She´s virgo and I always thought of her as very secretive and orderly. But the papers lying around showed something different.

I was shocked.

But when I saw them again and took a closer look I figured she might not be reporting all right.

This is AFWUL. Anyone been in the same situation. I work as an investigator for the government, with totally different things than small firms, self-employed. I don´t even know if the government cares about self-employed hiding some assets or income. No millions of course, but anyway quite a lot in her case. I don´t know what to do!!?

Please help. She knows my education and my occupation and I feel she does not respect me, when leaving things around like that. Almost like she wants to get caught? Or then just wants to show off, HAH you work for the government see how I fool you all the time, dare to act? I would never show anything about my affairs to anybody, except my closest real special friend who tells me his. This woman and I are NOT close friends. I think it is a lack of respect showing your things to almost strangers.

[Mark]

Personally, I don't consider tax fraud to be anything noteworthy unless we're talking about millions. The U.S. was, at one time, the greatest country in the world. We were on top of all the lists. We made the best of everything and we were the best at everything. In those days, we had a 90% tax bracket, usury laws, and tariffs. So, from my perspective, if she's just a small fish, she isn't a problem for the American people. People who get out of paying millions in taxes are the problem. As a citizen, I only expect someone to pay into the country's wellbeing if they live in opulent luxury on the backs of the people of the country. I would let the little fish just swim about wherever.

You know, it's also possible that she was absent-minded in leaving out the papers and it actually had nothing to do with you! It's at least possible. The tax thing doesn't seem to be a problem. Your alleged friendship seems to be the problem. I would focus on the "friendship," if I wanted to be a constructive problem-solver.

[Gwenyhfair]

USA is not the only country in the world

Of course its simple to say one only would care about the fiscally important ones. Things are anyhow not that easy. SUch persons would never ever let any papers be seen by mistake (and that´s what I know for sure) and it´s quite hard to get evidence.

This person has never ever been absent-minded when it comes to her job. The most thorough person I´ve ever known, almost paranoid sometimes.

I just realised there is no "friendship" to take care of. I´ve been trying to be friendly with a dummy or something, we have absolutely nothing in common. She has just been polite and I believed it was friendship.... By coincidence, or then not, these both things I found out at the same time.

[tikana]

Mark

I never considered the US to be the greatest country in the world but it is a country where with no education you can become a millionaire by inventing something stupid like Smuggie or clap clap clap lights on and off thing. How can the US claim to be the greatest country in the world where 90% of infostructures of cities in the US are collapsing from age. Levies in the US are old and falling apart, buildings in downtown seattle are not really retrofitted to survive a cascadia quake (it is all brick), remember Katrina? Infostructure collapsed. The US fairly recently ended segregation issue. We do not have affordable colleges, we do not have any safety nets from if the market will collapse scenario. 401k plans and retirements down the drain with it. We do not have affordable health care. Why is it that if you go to ER you get an xray, the next day you go to your own doctor, he/she forces you to take another xray and bills to insurance company? Who the heck let the US to use other countries as backyard war game playground? Now the US govt is harvesting what they planted. I am not being anti-american, it i just i am sick and tired of dirty brainwashing. Anyone who bought the US is the greatest country in the world propaganda is delusional. That is why people are slowly beginning to live off the grid.

T

Originally Posted by Mark

Personally, I don't consider tax fraud to be anything noteworthy unless we're talking about millions. The U.S. was, at one time, the greatest country in the world. We were on top of all the lists. We made the best of everything and we were the best at everything. In those days, we had a 90% tax bracket, usury laws, and tariffs. So, from my perspective, if she's just a small fish, she isn't a problem for the American people. People who get out of paying millions in taxes are the problem. As a citizen, I only expect someone to pay into the country's wellbeing if they live in opulent luxury on the backs of the people of the country. I would let the little fish just swim about wherever.

You know, it's also possible that she was absent-minded in leaving out the papers and it actually had nothing to do with you! It's at least possible. The tax thing doesn't seem to be a problem. Your alleged friendship seems to be the problem. I would focus on the "friendship," if I wanted to be a constructive problem-solver.

[Mark]

Gwenyhfair: Whether or not you are American, the point is valid. I was trying to separate the two issues that seem to have become one in your mind. Your "friendship" with this woman and her personal finances are two completely separate issues. The only thing that brought them together is timing that is probably spurious. I would ignore the tax issues simply because those issues are between her and the government. The "friendship" is another matter. It seems likely that the "friendship" has always been one of convenience for her, which is quite common.

tikana: I said, "The U.S. was, at one time, the greatest country in the world." We obviously are not the greatest country any longer and we haven't been for quite some time. In fact, what we see today is how the mighty have fallen. We were once at the top of every list and now we're only on top of lists like the number of prisoners held. We used to make the best of everything and now we have no industry on our own soil. We used to have jobs and now they have mostly been outsourced, primarily due to lack of industry. I didn't intend to claim that we are now the greatest country in the world. The point I wanted to make was the fact that when we were the greatest country, we had a 90% tax bracket, usury laws, and tariffs. Today, the rich (who own nearly all forms of media and are well known to network with each other secretly) are telling us that the rich need to be allowed to make their money. The top 2% is benefiting outrageously right now and everyone else is losing. What we need to realise is that there is just as much money in existence now as there was before this most recent "crash" took place. So, the question becomes, "Who has all of our damned money?!" We have more than enough money and resources to feed all the hungry and house all the homeless. Who gets to enjoy that money instead of the hungry and homeless: the ones who are able to take the most and leave nothing for others. This is why we have fallen so far and so hard. It's also what will destroy the country we now know, because the top 2% who own and control everything are willing to burn the whole world to protect what they've taken. We need to remember that their money used to be our money. Phrases like, "...of the people, by the people, and for the people," used to mean something. This is why I am content to let the small fish do as they please. The big fish are the ones who took our necessities and liberties! That's why I expect them to pay for it. They cry, "class warfare," against ideas like this. I've spent years working in the most intolerable conditions I could imagine for $8/hour (after year 2000), so I know what it is like to live on the wrong end of real class warfare everyday and be totally helpless against it!

[Gwenyhfair]

Mark: in a way your point is valid. Only I know there are huge differences between taxation in the US and my country. Not going into it deeper, but mention one thing. Last year there was in the USA an opportunity for wealthy tax avoiders to come out in the light, report themselves to the IRS. Then they only had to pay the taxes withdrawn, not interest or penalty fees. In my part of the world we don´t really have millionaires not paying taxes. If there are any such people, very rich who want to minimize taxes they either move abroad, and see to it they only stay in their own home country less than half a year (in that way they simply become tax-exempt ihabitants of the country).

Or then funds are moved through a home country bank to a bank offshore or in the Alps. The bank secrecy laws here prevent our government even from getting any such information from our local banks. AND this is a point that not every OECD-member country has. That is why there is much more focus on smaller enterprises and their possible tax fraud here. And not only a thing between the entrepreneur and the govt. People can anonymously tell what they know or have seen. Then it is up to the authorities what will follow.

[Mark]

Okay, if you want put to all the cards on the table, I can be more direct. Honestly, I wanted you to see that the two issues were separate so that you wouldn't exact revenge on this woman and then give some lame excuse like, "I was only doing the right thing. She shouldn't have cheated." That was the thought motivating me.

[Gwenyhfair]

of course I knew you were thinking that way (revenge), simple minds always do Meaning most ppl do nothing wrong with that. But it ´s not about that. Even if I tell what I ´ve seen there is no way I could ever know when or if the "irs" go to her. That´s the system here.

It was more about seeing what a person is doing and then also realising there is no real friendship. Okay, finding out she´s probably fooling the system made me like her less but I don´t believe in revenge. I have learend we never know what is good or bad for ourselves and our friends. Sometimes somebody has betrayed me, a so called friend put up a revenge plan. And lately I found out it was a blessing in disguise.

Today is valentines and I came back here cause I was thinking about friendship, like is this woman a friend or not.

[mysticskye]

Honestly, it sounds as if you may be using your vindictiveness to "get" your friend, who is not really a friend anymore. Unless she is harming you personally, I wouldn't take any action. I don't think it would make anyone's life any easier by a 'friend' ratting out a 'friend'. Maybe you should let her get busted on her own, without your help. Then you will not have to be in a terribly sticky, uncomfortable situation.