Should you go to prison for tax evasion?

The thread title says it all, basically.

My take: Definitely no. I really don't consider tax evasion that big a deal. Punishment should be more along the lines of having to pay the taxes you evaded plus a relatively minor penalty.
Also, I'd argue for fairly generous statues of limitations (maybe something like 5 years - and anything before that you don't have to pay anything).

Basically, prison should be for violent folk.

Yet I'll admit I don't know what should be done with non-violent criminals.

Totally disagree. Fraudsters who destroy people's lives can be just as bad as murderers.

Fraudsters should be punished as severely as every other criminal. Yet imprisonment isn't a one size fits all remedy.

Again, I'll admit I don't know what should be done with non-violent criminals.

I think that if we started throwing white collar criminals in the general population, you would see a significant reduction in white collar crime. Right now they know they go to summer camp for a few seasons and get out, so its worth the risk. I think the dollar amount of the tax evasion should come into play. Have a dividing point at say 10K and at that point you start doing real time in real prison for tax fraud or any other kind of white collar crime.

Yes. Why not?

Having to pay back the taxes is not really part of the punishment, just as a thief handing back whatever he stole after getting caught isn't. So all there's left is a "relatively minor penalty", which means that evading taxes is kind of encouraged from a risk-analysis point of view: you have a huge amount of money to gain and, in the not-so-likely event of getting caught, only a minor sum to lose. For punishment to make sense, what you risk by committing the crime has to outweigh what you gain by it.

Something I've been thinking about lately: when you're convicted of tax evasion, can you still vote? If not, how is that legal re: the 24th Amendment?

Put the violent ones to death and then you've got room for more non-violent ones.

I would have given Bernie Madoff a firing squad, but that's just me.

I don't believe in prison for white collar criminals.

Make them pay what they owe plus interest plus a substantial fine and make certain they are audited every year for five years.

Depends on the severity of the white collar crime. Madoff was a white collar criminal and he should never see daylight.

Why?

What threat is he to anyone if he were home confined with an anklet and required (with the oversight of a forensic accountant) to make as much money as he could legally to pay off as many of his victims as possible?

Okay - had a friend who had an idea about changing prison.
Violent Criminals: placed in specially built prisons. They have a hole in the top for food to be sent down. Once a month the place was gassed with sleeping gas to knock everyone out. Dead folk were removed for burial (if there was anything left).
Folks who killed someone but not premeditated (ie manslaughter, DUI): Given amkle bracelet. Worked and supported the family of the person they killed.
Non violent "white collar" Criminals: given an ankle bracelet. Allowed to work. Money split to repay anyone they needed to repay (con men who took your money paid you back).
Second offenders of above sent to regular prisons, given opportunity to work and continue to support the folks they harmed.

Smart ones will keep their noses clean for 5 years. Not hard for them.

Audit for 15 years. Or more.

Reducing your tax burden as much as possible is, dare I say it? Patriotic.

See, this is reasonable and would benefit everyone involved.
This means it will never happen.

If only there were a way to extrude and extract all their bodily nutrients, and convert it to cash somehow.

Course, society would have to be re-ordred so people could only ever be worth their nutrient content, and no more.

Ah, but what the hell?
So long as I'm entertained.

Sure, he can just be free to scam some more people. How would he make money? Would you invest in the new, improved Bernie Madoff? Would you hire Bernie Madoff?

The former office manager of the company I work for got caught a couple of years ago for embezzling. In the course of the police investigation, it was learned that her 2 previous employers had fired her for embezzling, but didn't press charges.

She's now spending a couple of years as a guest of the TDOC.

Right where the bitch belongs.

Maddof's ho belongs in prison.

Good lord you're a fucking idiot. Every time something like this comes up you chime in with some fantasy land bullshit.

When you go to prison you get mixed in with everyone else. The only exceptions would be former law enforcement, child molesters, and snitches would go into one area of the prison. Also medical prisoners would go to a special section of the prison. Obviously death row inmates are separate from everyone and troublemakers who refuse to behave are confined (or sent to a Supermax).

Otherwise everyone else is in the same spot.

There is no fucking summer camp. Anywhere in the country. Not at the county level. Not at the state level. And not at the Federal level.

Bernie Madoff is hanging out with gang bangers.

Whatever you evade, you pay back double?

Because it's a very minor, victimless "crime". I wouldn't even call it a crime, probably more like a misdemeanor.
Punishing them in the same way as, say, a murderer seems inappropriate.

Not really an applicable comparison as tax evasion isn't the same as theft.

It's far from being victimless. If you don't pay taxes but still utilise the services paid for by other peoples' taxes, it's kind of obvious who the victims are.
Of course, you might argue that you never signed something that says you want those services, that you don't use them anyway (which would be a lie), that it's unfair that you should pay more (in absolute amount) than some other person using the same services, but then that would be a whole different discussion on taxes themselves, not about evading them. Once you accept that taxes are there and are necessary, it kind of follows that not paying them has to be discouraged.

It does, but then I don't suggest life in prison for tax evasion. I actually don't care whether it's prison or some hefty fine, point is it's got to hurt.

Doesn't matter. As long as it is considered a crime (or illegal, if you prefer that expression), the potential costs of evading taxes multiplied by the risk of getting caught have to be higher than what you can gain, otherwise you encourage it. If I gain 100000 by evading taxes and pretty much all I gotta do when I get caught is pay them back, it's always worth a try. If the chances of getting caught are low, it's even worth it if there's some 'minor' fine involved.

So you think we should imprison those who use the social benefits system when they could get a job?

As I've yet to encounter anyone who doesn't pay any taxes, this argument can go join Dorothy, the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion on their trip to Oz - evasion is where you purposefully avoid paying the full amount of tax the state thinks you should, you still pay into the system though.

And the counterpoint to it being wrong to use services paid for by others, is that it is equally wrong to expect people who don't use services to pay for them. Can't see any government wanting to open that can of tasty worms.

The only time where evasion can be considered genuinely harmful is when a nation - Greece being a current example - has such a large structural deficit and a culture of evasion. At which point you have to ask just why the government hasn't dealt with the endemic corruption and allowed such a deficit to arise in the first place.

I'll go one further, and say Republicans should have their limbs torn off with a winch for so much as setting foot on a road after so much as bitching about taxes.

Nah. In a fitting homage to the Red Dawnification of the Republican party, they should have their limbs gnawed off by rabid wolverines.

And the Democrats who raised the taxes should have a similar painful death

Send them to prison and make them break rocks with a nail file.

Also if there name starts with a T they must be placed in a yard with small landmines (Just enough bang to blow a bit of the foot off)