Around 1 in 6 Americans Do Not Pay Their Taxes

With Only 1% of Individual Returns Being Audited and 16% of People Simply Not Paying Their Taxes, Will Even More People Stop Paying Too?

According to an IRS spokesperson in an article about anti-war tax resistance, 16.3% of Americans are in non-compliance with their taxes according to the Associated Press. That isn't fudging the numbers or coming up with creative tax deductions; it's simply evading taxes outright. While the story about the anti-war movement calling on people to not pay taxes to protest the war is interesting, the fact that a growing number of Americans are simply evading taxes is startling.

According to IRS estimates, that means there is $345 billion in uncollected taxes per year or roughly 2.6% of the national GDP. As a result of collection efforts, the IRS has generated over $48 billion of that amount in 2006 (or about 15%) according to CNN. These estimates do not include corporations using tax shelters (which "legally" protect them from taxes) or the rich using similar tactics. In 2006, the IRS audited about 1.3 million tax returns out of 130 million filed or an audit rate of about 1% according to an IRS source quoted by CNN. With over 16% overtly flouting the IRS, at best only 1% of those will even be challenged.

The reasons individuals give for not paying taxes vary. There are those who protest the war or other actions of the government. The IRS considers those objections frivolous. There are a few who don't believe that the income tax amendment was passed properly. And then there are some who just don't want to pay taxes because they want that money. With a founding slogan of "no taxation without representation", the United States has a long history of hating taxes. The nation was founded on it.

Henry David Thoreau refused to pay taxes during the Mexican-American war and many Vietnam war protestors such as Joan Baez did not pay taxes during that time either.