Greece recovers 1bn of the 8bn euros of lost tax

[DCBob]

from BBC..

Greece has collected almost 1bn euros ($1.3bn; £830m) in back taxes, still a fraction of the amount outstanding.

The head of the European Union's Greek task force said the haul of 946m euros compared with about 8bn euros in uncollected tax revenues.

-snip-

As part of these bailouts, Greece has passed several austerity packages to reform its public sector and claw back tax that has never been collected.

Tax evasion is generally considered to be widespread in Greece.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17398168

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My comments: Well, that is a step in the right direction. I suspect the vast majority of those lost taxes are from the wealthy and well-connected in Greece.

[barbtries]

1. they'd almost have to be,

since everyone else is mired in austerity.

i think Greece will be my first trip to europe. i've wanted to go there ever since i read The Magus 40 years ago. now when i go i'll be helping their economy too, hopefully.

[DCBob]

2. I suspect there are some great travel deals now in Greece.

I hope more people are thinking like you. Tourism revenue will help them out of this mess.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

3. Tax evasion is a national pastime in Greece

Has been for generations.

[fasttense]

4. Tax evasion by the Ultra Wealthy is a national pastime

The New York Times had published the total owed to Greece in unpaid taxes (in dollars) and the number of people owing. It averaged over $400,000,000 for each person. Now it would take me over 26,000 years to rack up a tax bill that high. Even if half is due to fines it would take me 13,000 years to rack that up.

It is NOT the middle class and poor who owe all this money to the federal government. It is people like Onassis or the Waltons who owe almost all the taxes.