Letter to an IRS agent
I recently wrote this to my friend who works for the IRS. Taxes are necessary, especially for the national defense. Two cases to support this: The Irish of the 8th and 9th century, and the American Indians of the 14th through the 19th. The Irish and the Indians lacked a centralized government, and therefore paid no taxes. Because of this, trade flourished and war was non-existent among them. However, both societies were destroyed by outsiders who paid taxes, and who therefore had the means to support a well-trained army. Lesson: pay enough taxes to provide for the common defense. The question now arises: how much should the people pay? This is where your job comes in. You might not get to set the tax rate, but it is your job to make sure people pay up. Why does an ordinarily honest citizen risk “stealing” from the government? Because a man evades taxes that he considers unreasonably high. In other words, tax evasion does not prove that Americans are criminals; rather, it proves...