Why are greedy tax cheats accorded protected species status?

Adele Horin in The Sydney Morning Herald (December 15), has rightfully pointed out the slanted position taken by authorities when addressing the issue of moneys missing from the public purse.

Horin takes a look at how welfare cheats and tax cheats are treated in Australia.

Welfare cheats are soft targets so they get a hammering but tax cheats, who are a protected species, get easy runs home.

In part, Horin wrote:

If tax cheats were hounded as assiduously as welfare cheats, Australia would be better off. But under the old regime, welfare cheats - so-called - were pursued to the ends of the Earth while tax cheats slid under the radar.

Millions of dollars were poured into detecting welfare fraud while in the last years of the Howard government one-third as much was spent tracking down tax cheats, according to budget papers.

The inequity led Professor John Braithwaite, of the Australian National University, an expert on corporate crime, to remark last year that the DPP had taken "soft, easy cases and they are the frauds of poor people. The frauds of sophisticated rich people who are aggressively defended by the best lawyers money can buy deliver lower success rates [to the DPP]."

The government stood to recoup far more from tax cheats than from welfare cheats. On economic grounds alone, it should have ramped up the fight against tax avoiders. According to budget papers, for every dollar spent chasing tax avoiders, the government would recoup $7.53 compared with only $1.94 from the welfare fraudsters. In the end, fewer than 3500 people are convicted of welfare fraud in a year from a population of 6.5 million social security recipients.

Read the entire article "Tax dodgers laughing as the poor are hounded" at:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/tax-dodgers-laughing-as-the-poor-are-hounded/2007/12/14/1197568262862.html


Unfortunately, Horin didn't include superannuation cheats in her article. Although they didn't get a mention, superannuation cheats are out there in big numbers.

So, you ask, "Who are the superannuation cheats?"

Answer: These cheats are thieving employers who do not make the mandatory super contributions for their employees.

"Who's responsible for ensuring employers do the right thing and meet their responsibilities and pay their employees' super?"

Answer: The Australian Taxation Office.

"If the ATO doesn't address the issue of tax cheats properly how can it be expected to address the problem of super cheats?"

Answer: To use the words of Horin, "more hounding, and more tabloid headlines, would not go astray."

PS:
Memo to all employees - contact your super fund and check to see that your employer has paid your super in full. Unfortunately, many employees are being dudded every pay period. Their pay slips show how much super should be going to their fund BUT their employers are pocketing it for themselves.