Google Maps Used To Find Tax Cheats

phantomfive writes "Some countries are worried about the privacy implications of Google Maps, but Lithuania is using them to find tax cheats. 'After Google's car-borne cameras were driven through the Vilnius area last year, the tax men in this small Baltic nation got busy. They have spent months combing through footage looking for unreported taxable wealth. ... Two recent cases netted $130,000 in taxes and penalties after investigators found houses photographed by Google that weren't on official maps. ... "We were very impressed," said Modestas Kaseliauskas, head of the State Tax Authority. "We realized that we could do more with less and in shorter time."' The people of Lithuania don't seem to mind. 'Authorities have been aided by the local populace. "We received even more support than we expected," said Mr. Kaseliauskas.'"

Comments

But of course they do!

[war4peace]

The people of Lithuania don't seem to mind. 'Authorities have been aided by the local populace. "We received even more support than we expected," said Mr. Kaseliauskas.'

It's only normal and expected. I would help authorities catch the assholes who don't pay their taxes. Unfortunately, where I live authorities don't even try catching them, mainly because they're all the same.

Re:But of course they do!

[JimMcc]

The wealthy(especially so in countries with high levels of economic inequality) are where the assets are, often a commanding percentage of them; but they also have by far the most sophisticated measures for avoiding taxation.

Like the USA? We have greater economic inequality since the robber baron era. And we seem hell bent on becoming the newest third world country.

Re:But of course they do!

[Rinikusu]

It is real fucking unfair, especially when you consider the reason why those ~50% of the people "not paying income tax" don't pay income tax because they don't make ANY FUCKING MONEY to fucking tax because those 10% have fucking siphoned all the FUCKING MONEY that would have gone to wages for people to FUCKING PAY TAXES ON into their own pockets. You stupid FUCKING moron.

Re:But of course they do!

[dryeo]

(I'm in Canada which shouldn't be much different) That's true for the bottom 10% or so, it's the next 40 or 50% that really suffer. There was a recent study, no link sorry, that the bottom 50% of Canadians actually pay a larger percent of their income in taxes and government fees then the top 50%. It's the fees that are the real killer. Need tires? Well there's a $20 environment fee so if all you can afford is the $60 cheap Chinese tire that you'd be nuts to take on the freeway, well there's a 33% tax, I mean fee, plus the sales tax and GST on the fee bringing the price up to close to $100 per tire plus mounting and balancing. Buy a top of the line S rated tire for $300 a piece, well the fee is still $20 so you're paying $320 plus taxes. Either way disposal consists of throwing the worn tires into a container and shipping to Africa for a small profit so the environment fee is just a tax that hits the poor
There are a million example of similar fees and taxes that actually hit the poor harder so even though they pay little income tax they don't have any near the money left over from taxes etc compared to the rich who also get low income tax and pay a much smaller percent in fees. Oh, GST is reimbursed if you're a business as well here and if you're rich, you have a business and tax number.

Why wouldn't the people support them?

[Qwavel]

Personally, I would think that people would be happy to help the tax cops find the tax cheats. When rich people and corporations cheat on their taxes I have to pay more.

And yet I understand his surprise. For some reason, ordinary joes & janes (who get a salary and have little opportunity to cheat on their taxes) often seem to be against the idea of clamping down on high-end tax cheats. For some reason, their feeling that taxes are unpleasant (to put it mildly) translates into an aversion to the idea of them being properly enforced.

Re:Why wouldn't the people support them?

[gnasher719]

Here's how some people think:

1. I want to be rich.
2. If I was rich, I wouldn't want to pay a lot of taxes.
3. Therefore, I don't want rich people to pay a lot of taxes.

It's totally irrational, but that's how it goes.

Re:Why wouldn't the people support them?

[h4rr4r]

Yeah, it seems nearly all Americans think of themselves merely as temporarily embarrassed millionaires. Which leads to stupidity like people voting for politicians that promise to cut the taxes of the rich and end the programs that the voter needs to eat.

Re:Why wouldn't the people support them?

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't speak for him, but I want my fellow countrymen to feel good about themselves, have opportunities, make opportunities, and not be beholden to the people they vote into office for their livelihood. I want them to earn their housing, food, and medical care, because not only do we all get the benefit of their labor, but we also get less crime, better cared-for children, and other benefits. They too will get benefits that can't be had any other way: self-respect and personal growth for instance.

Should there be a safety net? Almost certainly. But if even a quarter of the people who talk like you put their money where their mouth is (as I do), handling it privately will not only work out just fine, but will also be fair, less violent (follow *any* law backwards and you get the use of force), more efficient, actually create opportunities, and be much less prone to corruption.

Re:Why wouldn't the people support them?

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

You are delusional. Government is not the major threat to your liberty now. It is the corporations and rich guys who threaten your liberty. The rich will use any means to threaten your liberty. Right now they buy politicians, corrupt the government, run astro turf organizations, hire shills and liars to get you. Among all these instruments they use, democratic government is the only thing that you can use at some point to get the control back, get the country back. At some point enough people will pay enough attention to clean up the mess.

And the rich know it too. So they use all the resources they have to create a pathological irrational antipathy to all government and persuade you to reduce taxes and reduce it ability to enforce laws. Just remember this, if you actually manage to starve the government out of existence, there is nothing to stop you from being enslaved by the rich once again.

If you are not rich, the democracy is the only weapon you have, the only way to achieve liberty. Starving the beast is a snake oil sold by self serving rich people and the shills bought by them.

Here's one person who doesn't support them

[Anonymous Coward]

I applaud tax evasion, since I don't believe in about 99% of what government does with tax money. Naturally, the less money in the hands of coercive authority, the less damage they can do. Keep it up, friends.

Re:Here's one person who doesn't support them

[dkleinsc]

That's stupid for 2 reasons:
1. I'll bet you good money you believe in more than 1% of what the government is doing: 1% of the US federal budget is $38 billion, which just about covers either federal law enforcement (including prosecutions) or transportation infrastructure (including air travel, highways, rail, and cargo shipping), but not both. Cut out law enforcement and you might as well not have a legal system. Cut out transportation and all that stuff you currently see showing up in your local Walmart won't get there. I highly doubt you want to live in that kind of country.

2. If Paul evades taxes successfully, the government will simply try to collect revenue from someone else. If they can't, they will borrow the money to function. If they can't borrow the money, they will inflate the currency.

Basically, your argument, which I'm guessing you think is libertarian, is actually anarchist - a coercive authority with no money can't do anything at all. So on that basis, I'd recommend that you move to Somalia, Afghanistan, or one of the other areas of the world that has no functioning government whatsoever, and thus no taxes.

Re:Here's one person who doesn't support them

[AuMatar]

We tried that. People were dieing from unsafe food products- meat that was slaughtered in unsanitary conditions, alcohol that has gasoline and other non-edible fillers added in, and crooks who just plain lied about what was in their product. Read Upton Sinclair's The Jungle sometime.

Foo and shelter for the poor? Non-government efforts have been attempted since pre-Roman times. They all failed miserably- people would literally die of starvation in major cities. Now we have government efforts. They're not perfect, but they work- the starvation in western civilizations is damn near zero, the remainder being child abuse cases.

Defense- please tell me how you're going to self organize for defense against an opponent that can kill you by tens of thousands from a continent away, and pay for this effort? Oh, and please tell me how you'll do this without creating an organization that will just take power.

Roads? Well since we never prevented anyone from building them, the US must have a had a sweet set of private roads for cross country travel before the government stepped in and fucked them up. Oh wait, it was the exact opposite- the government was needed to build and finance the interstate system. In fact, there's been no time in the history of the world where an extensive network of private roads was made adequate to the nation's transportation needs.

Step the fuck out of fantasyville and into the real world.