Yeah, it’s an imperfect first-stab calculation at best. But that doesn’t mean that 1 in 12,000 is necessarily an underestimate because while the 8,143,000 denominator may be exaggerated for the reasons you suggest; the 699 numerator is too, for the reason I gave (“even if every one of those prosecutions had been of people who merely refused to pay”). In fact, few to none of those 699 prosecutions were of people who merely refused to pay. An appendix to their report shows how many indictments the IRS pursued in a variety of categories (this adds up to more than 699 because some non-tax crimes e.g. narcotics, money laundering are also prosecuted via the same unit). Non-payment doesn’t even make the list:
Yeah, it’s an imperfect first-stab calculation at best. But that doesn’t mean that 1 in 12,000 is necessarily an underestimate because while the 8,143,000 denominator may be exaggerated for the reasons you suggest; the 699 numerator is too, for the reason I gave (“even if every one of those prosecutions had been of people who merely refused to pay”). In fact, few to none of those 699 prosecutions were of people who merely refused to pay. An appendix to their report shows how many indictments the IRS pursued in a variety of categories (this adds up to more than 699 because some non-tax crimes e.g. narcotics, money laundering are also prosecuted via the same unit). Non-payment doesn’t even make the list:
Abusive Tax Schemes: 35
Corporate Tax Fraud: 23
Financial Institution Fraud: 20
Bank Secrecy Act: 338
Employment Tax: 142
Healthcare Fraud: 69
Abusive Return Preparer Program: 112
Identity Theft: 88
Money Laundering: 701
International Operations: 143
Narcotics: 475
Non-Filer: 115
Public Corruption: 27
Questionable Refund Program: 51
Terrorism: 33