Indeed. And then you'd gladly take advantage of the social safety net if you became unemployed, or upon retirement, and of the roads the government built, and of the safety the police provides, etc.
Not paying taxes is great if you don't cost the government anything. All of a sudden, though, when you want the services but don't want to pay for them, you become the leech that people keep accusing the poor of being.
You may say, “but I never said I wanted any of those things!” Too bad. You live in a society, and a democratic one at that (or at least I assume as much—these citizens certainly do). That means if you want to pay fewer taxes, “all” you have to do is convince enough people that the government shouldn't provide a safety net, and then reduce taxes accordingly. In the meantime, just like you can't murder or steal because society says it's wrong, you shouldn't be able to dodge taxes.
And by the by, because these countries have VAT, when people don't pay their taxes, typically what they do is they ask the customer to pay VAT (because it's included in the price), and then they pocket the resulting money.
No, there really is no justification whatsoever for tax evasion. At least no more of one than there is for stealing. In the end, it is still illegal. When a government fails to enforce said illegality, you get a system that breaks.
The point I was trying to make is that giving half of everything to the government is rather unnecessary in order to have a "social safety net". The things you mentioned, unemployment, retirement, roads, police, etc, don't require giving up half my income.
And guess what? People recognize that. And when people think they're being jerked around..
Honestly? You'd have to show me the spreadsheets to prove that assertion. Not that the current system in any country is likely to be 100% efficient, mind you, but I suspect it's more efficient than you give it credit for. That said, that's hand-waving in both directions. I have no numbers to support my own suspicions, either.
Also keep in mind that it isn't half of everything. These systems are typically progressive, so it's likely because this will be a large sum ($220,000) all at once that the tax rate is that high.
It seems to me that the 43% rate is excessive on something that, as others have pointed out, is not a large income ($96,000 over 4 years -> $24k/year) - I don't know of any country where you'd pay that tax rate so soon. I assume this would happen if he gets all the money in one hit - so to me, it's not really "tax evasion" in the nasty sense to set up a company etc such that he pays tax on 4 years of $24k rather than one year of $96k. And personally, I'd find it more attractive if slightly less of the money wasn't going to go to the Italian government.
(I am not actually an expert in matters of the Italian tax system, so I guess it's possible that they all pay 43% tax on all income, although goodness knows how the country could be in such dire straits if that's the case)
Not paying taxes is great if you don't cost the government anything. All of a sudden, though, when you want the services but don't want to pay for them, you become the leech that people keep accusing the poor of being.
You may say, “but I never said I wanted any of those things!” Too bad. You live in a society, and a democratic one at that (or at least I assume as much—these citizens certainly do). That means if you want to pay fewer taxes, “all” you have to do is convince enough people that the government shouldn't provide a safety net, and then reduce taxes accordingly. In the meantime, just like you can't murder or steal because society says it's wrong, you shouldn't be able to dodge taxes.
And by the by, because these countries have VAT, when people don't pay their taxes, typically what they do is they ask the customer to pay VAT (because it's included in the price), and then they pocket the resulting money.
No, there really is no justification whatsoever for tax evasion. At least no more of one than there is for stealing. In the end, it is still illegal. When a government fails to enforce said illegality, you get a system that breaks.