Pakistan hatches scheme to claw back tax

2 thoughts on “Pakistan hatches scheme to claw back tax”

1. ….Under the scheme, a one-off flat payment of 40,000 Pakistani rupees — just short of $420 — will wipe the slate clean for even lifelong tax evaders…… that is a deal worth taking for us VDP/OVDI/OVDP junkies 🙂

2. I am sure that Senator Schumer would love portions of this…,

   It aims to put every Pakistani adult into one of the world’s largest multi-biometric databases.

   “We have 452 static centers where people are coming and giving this data, we have 250 mobile vans, we have a motorcycle service, and we (even) have people up in the mountains — skiers and mountaineers with man-pack units,” says NADRA Chairman Tariq Malik whose mission it is to log every potential taxpayer in Pakistan.

   With half the population already registered under the scheme, it’s a platform for paying out benefits, track ID fraud and to track down tax evaders.

   Although that amnesty program is too easy for the IRS. Where is the long list of FAQs and endless technical thresholds… and only a 4 year promise? For the US it is a lifetime promise.

   Pakistan’s tax chief Ali Arshad Hakeem is calling for a tax amnesty with a difference — a one-time payment with no questions asked about the past but a promise to file tax returns for the next four years.

   Although…(with tongue-in-cheek license.)

   Nevertheless, Ex IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman has criticized the scheme as a license to launder money, saying the government should simply crack down on evaders rather than give them breathing space. Follow the American example. It works better.

   Pakistan’s former chief economist, Ashfaque Hassan Khan, said the plan was unfair to those who did pay taxes and would encourage others to wait for similar amnesties in the future.