By Cho Mu-hyun
The National Tax Service (NTS) plans to crack down on tax evaders by increasing fines up to 60 times.
According to a report filed to Cheong Wa Dae by the tax agency Wednesday, it plans to increase fines on fraudulent activities such as concealing income, forging documents or lying during official investigations to 300 million won from the current 5 million won.
Repeat offenders will receive individual fines per offence, even for the same kind of illegal activity.
The agency also plans to aggressively target high-income professionals and affluent businessmen as part of its plan to normalize the so-called underground economy. Its goal is to secure 28.5 trillion won in five years through removing the black economy. The new tax revenue will be used for welfare payments.
To do this, the NTS will form a taskforce, consisting of 74 officials, which will actively investigate tax evasion and other illegal activities.
The team's main goals are uncovering borrowed name accounts of high-income professionals, conglomerate slush funds and offshore tax evasion, as well as tracking loan sharking and irregular financial dealings.
The NTS also plans to add a clause that requires tax payers to be cooperative as a legal duty during official investigations.
The report also showed that the agency plans to lower the minimum requirement for cash receipts to 100,000 won from the previous 300,000 won. The measure is aimed on collecting taxes from businesses such as jewelry stores and wedding halls that deal heavily in cash.
It plans to reward those who report tax fraud with up to 1 billion won, up from the current 100 million won.
The NTS will also decrease the electronic tax statement requirement on self-employed businessmen to 300 million won from the previous 1 billion won to better track their activities.
It has also asked for permission from the National Assembly to have access to the Korea Financial Intelligence Service's data for tracking tax evasion.
It will also form an internal inspection division to check up on investigators suspected of malfeasance following the recent arrests of multiple NTS officials on bribery charges.
.jpg/dims/resize/740/optimize) |
Kim Duk-joong |
According to a report filed to Cheong Wa Dae by the tax agency Wednesday, it plans to increase fines on fraudulent activities such as concealing income, forging documents or lying during official investigations to 300 million won from the current 5 million won.
Repeat offenders will receive individual fines per offence, even for the same kind of illegal activity.
The agency also plans to aggressively target high-income professionals and affluent businessmen as part of its plan to normalize the so-called underground economy. Its goal is to secure 28.5 trillion won in five years through removing the black economy. The new tax revenue will be used for welfare payments.
To do this, the NTS will form a taskforce, consisting of 74 officials, which will actively investigate tax evasion and other illegal activities.
The team's main goals are uncovering borrowed name accounts of high-income professionals, conglomerate slush funds and offshore tax evasion, as well as tracking loan sharking and irregular financial dealings.
The NTS also plans to add a clause that requires tax payers to be cooperative as a legal duty during official investigations.
The report also showed that the agency plans to lower the minimum requirement for cash receipts to 100,000 won from the previous 300,000 won. The measure is aimed on collecting taxes from businesses such as jewelry stores and wedding halls that deal heavily in cash.
It plans to reward those who report tax fraud with up to 1 billion won, up from the current 100 million won.
The NTS will also decrease the electronic tax statement requirement on self-employed businessmen to 300 million won from the previous 1 billion won to better track their activities.
It has also asked for permission from the National Assembly to have access to the Korea Financial Intelligence Service's data for tracking tax evasion.
It will also form an internal inspection division to check up on investigators suspected of malfeasance following the recent arrests of multiple NTS officials on bribery charges.
![[INTERVIEW] Production company AStory expects great success with 'Extraordinary Attorney Woo' franchise](https://img.koreatimes.co.kr/upload/thumbnailV2/06bfe09b25694aafbd347202cbad4257.jpg/dims/resize/178/optimize)
