The Cheating of America: How Tax Avoidance and Evasion by the Super Rich Are Costing the Country Billions--and What You Can Do About It - Hardcover

Lewis, Charles

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 038097682X ISBN 13: 9780380976829

Publisher: William Morrow, 2001

Synopsis

Each year millions of income-earning adults and corporations do not pay their fair share of federal income taxes -- whether legally (tax avoidance), illegally (tax evasion), or through shady means (tax "avoision"), and their numbers are rising dramatically. In this explosive book, Charles Lewis, founder and executive director of the Center for Public Integrity, and Bill Allison, a former researcher at the Philadelphia Inquirer finger these culprits.

Super-rich individuals and corporations alike are increasingly using offshore channels to hide money from the IRS, which seems to have given up on trying to catch them. Meanwhile, the rest of the population suffers. The IRS recently reported that 2,680 filers with incomes of $200,000 or more claimed they owed no taxes, up from 612 in the mid-eighties, and 85 in 1977. While audits of these wealthy taxpayers have plummeted, audits of those earning less than $25,000 per year have risen. Not only that, but in 1997 only 2.3 percent of returns filed by the richest Americans were reviewed.

With The Cheating of America, Lewis and Allison aim to unmask those who are stiffing Uncle Sam, as well as the system that permits their activities. They reveal how blue-chip U.S. corporations take advantage of dubious shelters or move their taxable profits offshore. Frequently these same companies have also availed themselves of cheaper labor overseas, laying off thousands of American workers. Some estimates show that more than a trillion dollars are salted away in offshore bank accounts, beyond the reach of the Internal Revenue Service.

Lewis and Allison provide a richly detailed and colorful overview of the key players -- federal legislators, the IRS, New York banks, foreign "tax havens" -- and the cottage industry that teaches aspiring dodgers how to cheat successfully. At the heart of the book are case studies of some of the most brazen individuals and corporations, including the "Benedict Arnold Billionaires" who have expatriated from the United States in order to reduce or eliminate their tax burden.

With explosive investigative revelations and the authority of the Center for Public Integrity behind it, The Cheating of America will further educate all those who "pay their fair share" while the financial elite dodge their responsibility to society. Sure to enlighten and outrage, The Cheating of America is a must-read for every citizen.

About this title

Review:

This book is a group project; Charles Lewis and Bill Allison are the principle authors, but they have relied on an "investigative team" that includes 19 other individuals affiliated with the Center for Public Integrity, a left-of-center research organization in Washington, D.C. What they've assembled in The Cheating of America is a muckraking survey of how the rich and powerful shirk their responsibilities: "We investigate the people and companies who have benefited most from our society and our way of life and then chosen to thumb their noses at the rest of us, by paying little or no taxes." The book is full of facts and figures, many sure to outrage. The authors identify, for instance, some 45,000 tax returns filed by people earning more than $100,000 and paying less than 7 percent of their income to the federal government--compared to millions of workers who earn much less and proportionally pay much more. (One recent IRS report counted 2,680 filers with incomes of $200,000 or more claiming they owed no taxes at all, up from just 85 in 1977.)

What makes the book succeed, however, is not its careful number crunching, but all the little stories that detail "the phenomenon of tax avoidance (that's legal), tax evasion (that's illegal), and tax 'avoision' (catch us if you can)." There are the wealthy film producers who use offshore trusts and tax shelters to hide their income, the millionaire tax evaders who renounce their U.S. citizenship in order to escape making tax payments, and the accountants who help it all happen. At times, the book feels like a long Reader's Digest article, all told in the service of an outrageous conclusion: "Many of the nation's wealthiest individuals and its largest corporations are not paying their fair share of taxes today." The Cheating of America will appeal to readers who appreciated the Center for Public Integrity's previous efforts, as well as admirers of Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele. --John J. Miller

About the Author:

Charles Lewis is the founder and executive director of the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization focusing on ethics and public service issues. He has recently been awarded the 1998 McArthur "Genius" grant.

The Center For Public Integrity is the non-profit, nonpartisan watchdog organization that produced The Buying of the President in 1996 and The Buying of the Congress in 1998.

About this edition

• Publisher: William Morrow
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 038097682X
• ISBN 13: 9780380976829
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 320