“...paid their taxes...
If they are illegal, how are they paying “their taxes”. What is the tax on a case of beer anyway?”
Well, technically it is possible for illegal workers to pay taxes. If they are using a phony Social Security # and working for an employer that withholds federal, state, local and SS taxes. I would suspect though, that the smart ones (if there are any) would claim like 9 exemptions so no federal tax is withheld. Then all they would be paying is SS and Medicare tax.
This brings up a point that none of the candidates want to talk about-one “dirty little secret” as Rush likes to say is that the IRS has a list somewhere (I read this a couple years ago so I’m a bit fuzzy on the details) that has Social Security numbers of people who are paying into the system, but they don’t match a real person (citizen or permanent resident). I believe there are something like 4 million of these.
If the 4 million figure is accurate, that would be about how many illegal workers we have, not including those paid under the table, of which there are probably at least a million or two more.
Bottom line is the IRS could solve this problem by simply contacting the employers who send in witholding taxes on these phony Social Security numbers and telling them to either verify their accuracy or dismiss the employee, then threaten them with a fine if they don’t.
As Newt said last night on a different topic(ironically), “if we were serious about solving this problem, we have the means to do it” (I’m paraphrasing). The IRS could resolve the employment verification problem tomorrow, but they don’t because:
1. This administration and previous ones want these workers here mainly for political reasons.
2. If the IRS were to do this, they would be cutting off a sizable source of revenue to the treasury. Think about all that SS money that comes in from 4 million illegals that never has to get paid out in the future. If they lost that, the SS System would be in worse shape than it already is.
Okay, well I guess I got a bit off topic with that rant, but it feels better to get that off my chest.
Bingo! I get involved with this all the time. Illegals using American kids' social security numbers. Social Security is very helpful when you report it. They say, "Don't worry. We'll just remove the earnings from the child's records". (Where do it go?) Sometimes I think it's just better to let the earnings stay in the child's account if it doesn't interfere with other benefits the child currently receives such as disability.
Per recent news stories, for some it's "collected their Earned Income Tax Credit" refund check.