American tax officials

Chapter 305: Is there any hope for pushing forward with a tax bill?

With the nation's attention focused on this moment, the Speaker of the House walked onto the stage on the big screen and announced the official start of the vote on the Aid Bill.

The next second, the large screen hanging high in the House of Representatives began to display the vote count.

At the beginning, the votes for and against were roughly equal, but as time went on, the gap between the two began to emerge.

Within just three minutes, the number of votes in favor of the bill exceeded 200.

When the vote reached 217, the hearts of countless people across the country tightened even more, because as long as the number of votes in favor reached 218, it would mean that no matter what happened, the bill would definitely pass the House of Representatives.

However, as expected, the number of votes in favor not only exceeded 218, but also reached 296 before stopping.

"Sigh, it finally passed."

"Not only did it pass, it passed by an overwhelming majority, so it seems the Senate won't be surprised."

"1000 billion! This is our 1000 billion! In the end, it will still benefit those W country people."

Although they were mentally prepared, seeing the bill finally pass in the House of Representatives still brought a sense of awe to countless people across the country.

After all, this is 1000 billion yuan, which is not a small amount of money.

Meanwhile, at the Los Angeles IRS, Nissen smiled, collected the banknotes on the table, and taunted Simons and Baki, "Heh heh, looks like you underestimated Congress's support for this bill."

Bucky gave a wry smile and replied, "296 votes. That's an overwhelming number of votes. Based on our past bills, if the House gets this many votes, the Senate will at least pass it, if not 90% certain."

"They can just pass a bill and take away hundreds of billions of dollars that we worked so hard to get. This Congress really gets money so easily."

This 100 billion was the result of countless days and nights of hard work in their investigation of the Sackler family, Satoshi Nakamoto, and those cryptocurrency companies. It was like an egg they had laid themselves, but now it had been taken away by someone else with a single bill. So Simmons couldn't help but feel a pang of regret.

However, what no one noticed was that David's eyes suddenly flashed with a sharp light upon hearing this, as if he had thought of something.

Simmons' words actually woke him up.

Yes, they painstakingly tracked down the Sackler family, Satoshi Nakamoto, and those cryptocurrency companies, and finally managed to get such a large sum of money, only for Congress to easily take it away with just a bill.

So, could their IRS introduce another bill similar to the Black Tax Act?

For example, many wealthy people nowadays like to set up family trusts.

On the surface, this so-called foundation is for charity, but in reality, the estate tax in the United States is very high, reaching as high as 50%.

In other words, if you are a rich second-generation, and one day your father suddenly dies, and you want to inherit this money, you have to pay half of the family fortune to the IRS first.

Such a high tax amount would be incredibly painful for ordinary people, let alone the children of the wealthy.

However, setting up a family foundation is different. Wealthy individuals can donate their assets into this fund, and according to American tax law, charitable donations are generally not taxed, or if they are, the tax payable is very small.

Otherwise, do you really think that Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Mark Zuckerberg, and other Forbes-listed billionaires are so philanthropic, always promoting the idea of ​​donating their wealth and not leaving much for their children?

In fact, Bill Gates and his wife established the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation long ago, and have donated their wealth to the foundation over the years.

Buffett also established the Scottish Thompson Buffett Foundation long ago, and even announced that he would donate 100% of his wealth to it before his death.

As for the other wealthy individuals, the vast majority of them own their own foundations.

According to David, if he could introduce a fund tax bill that would remove the tax exemptions here, the resulting tax revenue would be an astronomical figure.

However, tax avoidance through funds is actually not that big of a deal.

As is well known, there are many tax havens in the world, such as the Cayman Islands, the British Virgin Islands, Bermuda, and the Caribbean.

In the United States, many well-known companies such as Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Oracle are registered in tax havens.

Take Apple for example. Last year, they paid less than $60 billion in taxes to the IRS.

Keep in mind, this is a company with a market value of over 2 trillion.

However, the amount of taxes paid to the IRS in a year was less than $60 billion, which can only be described as pitifully small.

So why does Apple pay such a small amount of taxes?

First, Apple employs complex tax arrangements globally, shifting profits to low-tax countries by establishing subsidiaries there, thereby reducing its tax burden in high-tax countries such as the United States.

This strategy is primarily achieved by establishing a subsidiary in Ireland, known as "Apple's European headquarters," which, despite having a relatively small number of employees, generates enormous profits.

Apple transfers a large portion of its global sales profits through this subsidiary, thereby reducing the taxes it pays in the United States.

Secondly, Apple further reduced its tax burden by setting up a special purpose vehicle in Ireland to transfer profits to tax havens such as the Cayman Islands.

This strategy takes advantage of differences in tax systems between countries, shifting profits to regions with lower tax rates, thereby reducing the overall tax burden.

Besides Apple, many well-known companies, such as Google, Microsoft, and Oracle, have also adopted this tax avoidance strategy.

If a law could be enacted to restrict these tax avoidance practices in different locations, these companies would no longer be able to enjoy such tax avoidance methods, and the resulting tax revenue would be an astronomical figure!

Of course, this idea was only in its early stages for David.

It's worth noting that the IRS had already exerted tremendous effort to get the Black Tax Bill passed in Congress.

The bill was able to pass mainly because its original intention was to combat criminals, without explicitly infringing on the interests of interest groups and the powerful. Ultimately, it was passed through compromise among various forces.

The fund tax bill and the off-site tax avoidance bill that David is now considering are both aimed at directly targeting the core interests of major financial groups and interest groups. This is no less than cutting their flesh with a knife. Therefore, passing them can be described in four words: it is extremely difficult!

However, although it is difficult, if either of these two bills can be passed, the rewards will be far greater than those of the Black Tax Act. It may even alleviate the current fiscal deficit in the United States and stimulate economic recovery.

If that were to happen, the prestige he would gain would not only be enough to support his entry into the General Administration, but could even support him in ascending to the highest position.

In short, it's high risk, but also high reward.

But David isn't ready to make a decision yet. He wants to observe the reactions from all sides after the W aid bill is passed, as well as the General Administration's plans, before deciding.

……

Three days after the bill passed the House of Representatives, the Senate completed its review of the bill and began voting on it.

As expected, the Senate passed the bill by a large margin of 61 votes to 39.

After a bill passes both the House and Senate, the final step is for the president to sign it, and then the bill officially takes effect.

The White House was the main driving force behind this bill, and upon seeing that it had passed both houses of Congress smoothly, it naturally signed it off as quickly as possible and then announced it to the whole country.

With this, the W aid bill issue has come to a close.

February 29st, 7 PM.

David was working in his office when his phone rang, making him stop. He picked it up and saw it was Sean calling. He answered immediately: "Mr. Sean."

"Director David, the Aid to W Act has been passed. The people at Onsa Group are very happy and are planning a celebration dinner. They would like to invite you to attend."

David was startled by Sean's voice on the other end of the phone, then asked, "Where is it being held?"

Washington, D.C.

David fell silent. The General Administration must know about his deal with the Ansar Group; they just turned a blind eye.

But if he were to attend the celebration banquet held by the Onsa Group, that would be a different story, which might displease some high-ranking officials in the General Administration.

After all, you, David, work for our tax authorities. Now that the Onsa Group is holding a celebration banquet, you're going to show your support. Does that mean you'll join their camp in the future?

If you join, will you disregard the interests of our IRS and instead seek more benefits for the Onsa Group?

"Director David, I think you should attend. I've heard that many important figures from the Onsa Group will be there, and with the passage of the Aid Act, the Freemasons have already taken action. At this time, securing the continued support of the Onsa Group is very important."

To be honest, after some thought, David actually wanted to attend the celebration banquet, but it wasn't as simple as just going to celebrate the success of the Onsa Group.

First, as Sean said, now that the Aid Act has been passed, the Freemasons are going to take action, and securing the support of the Onsa Group would indeed be very useful.

Secondly, if many important figures from the Anssa Group are coming this time, it would be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to probe their background.

When we arrive at the banquet, all we need to do is use the cheat code to scrutinize them and uncover some of the group's core secrets. Then, we might have a chance to take control of the group in the future.

"What do you think, Chief David?"

"Well then, Mr. Sean, let me think about this and give you an answer later."

"Can."

After hanging up the phone, David immediately dialed Donald's number and told him that he wanted to attend the party.

After listening to his words, Donald replied, "If you attend this banquet, it might indeed cause dissatisfaction among people like Vertonghen and Rahan. However, since you said that getting to the bottom of the Onsa Group would be helpful to us in the future, it is indeed worth the trip... Here's what we'll do: the tax investigation into the cryptocurrency sector has been completed. Come to the headquarters tomorrow to give a work summary and also discuss the subsequent tax direction with us."

If David were to make a special trip to Washington to attend this celebratory dinner, it would certainly provoke dissatisfaction from high-ranking officials like Vertonghen and Rahan.

However, if David were in Washington to report on his work and then attend the dinner, the resistance would be much less.

David naturally understood what Donald meant and immediately replied, "Okay, Deputy Director Donald, then I will prepare the relevant documents and materials tomorrow and go to Washington to report to you and the director."

"OK, see you tomorrow."

After ending his call with Donald, David immediately called Sean back. Sean was delighted to hear that David had agreed to come and offered to introduce him to many important figures from the Onsa Group the following evening.

And so, the next morning arrived.

David first went to the station to explain some matters concerning his trip to Washington, D.C., and then took Nixon, Bucky, and Simmons to Los Angeles International Airport to board a flight to Washington, D.C.

After a flight of more than five hours, the plane arrived over Washington and landed slowly at Dulles International Airport.

Knowing he was coming, the General Administration had arranged for personnel and vehicles to greet him well in advance. His group was picked up smoothly and returned to the General Administration.

Half an hour later, the vehicle carrying the group pulled up in front of the General Administration.

After getting out of the car and stepping through the gate, both David, Nixon, Bucky, and Simmons felt a mix of anticipation and emotion.

It had been several months since they last came here.

At that time, they had just received notice of being transferred to the western suburbs branch, but they didn't have a clear idea of ​​whether they could successfully complete the tax audit in Hollywood or when they could enter headquarters.

Now, when they return here, they have not only achieved success in Hollywood's tax audits, but also amassed a string of accolades for successful tax audits involving the Sackler family, Swiss banks, and the cryptocurrency industry.

You could say they were just one step away from joining the General Administration of Sport—no, maybe just half a step away!

(End of this chapter)