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Originally Posted by Chris
Tax avoidance is not fraud. Everyone does it, and they do it legally. If you buy a new car based on its road tax band, that’s tax avoidance. If as a commercial energy user you choose your supplier so as not to pay the fossil fuel levy, that’s tax avoidance. If you choose to put your savings in an ISA, that’s tax avoidance. For as long as the tax system is used to promote or deter behaviour, then the tax system itself is promoting tax avoidance. If you want to criticise tax avoidance, then be prepared to be found guilty yourself ...
Tax evasion, on the other hand, is not paying tax due, or disguising tax liability, or exploitation of unintended loopholes in tax regulations (and hiding it). Such is illegal.
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fraud: wrongful or criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain.
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In terms of the provision of public services and infrastructure, paid for by tax base, then those who use loopholes etc. to actively avoid paying the same effective tax rate as the majority is wrong and therefore fraud.
You use banal examples to distract from the serious point that those who have the wealth to employ active tax avoidance to minimise their tax burden should be pursued. The tax loop holes should be plugged, the "bad" laws repealed so that all sections of this society move to a more equitable effective tax rate.