in what is it like, people tell us what it’s like to have experiences that many of us can’t even imagine. In this entry, we spoke to Jim, a medical professional who hasn’t paid taxes in 10 years. (Understandably, Jim asked that only his first name be used.) Jim describes how his delinquency began, how it snowballed, and He told us about why he finally decided to come clean. In addition to being anonymized, this interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
I haven’t filed taxes for 10 years. Well, that’s not entirely true. I filed in 2020, but only so I could get a stimulus check. I’m currently in my late 40s, so I’ve been living tax-free since my late 30s. I lived in California, where expenses were high, so I worked a lot of odd jobs, including call centers, food service, hospitality, and bartending. But most importantly, I was an alcoholic for a long time. Bills needed to be paid and the rest of the money went into booze. It was a vicious cycle. The IRS sometimes wanted money I didn’t have because I had already spent it.
I don’t advise anyone to do this. Ever since I didn’t file my taxes for the first time, I knew I would have to face music someday. But, long story short, I needed money, but I was in a situation in my life where I didn’t really care about the possible outcome. I now live a middle class lifestyle, but when I first skipped tax day, my annual income was $30,000. And when I saw billionaires like Bill Gates and Elon Musk getting all the tax cuts, it was easy to justify my own delinquency while I was struggling. Those men were getting all these write-offs, but when I apply, I have to pay more or it’s going to be a wash.
For a while I insist Nine My income wasn’t taxed that much every month because it depended on my salary. It was something a friend of mine told me many years ago. Half the year he has 9 dependents and the other 6 months he switches and says he’s single before he actually has to file taxes. But I’ve never done the second half. I’ve spent the last 10 years trying to support a large family without actually filing a tax return with her IRS.
And you know what? That’s basically it. It was after I applied to receive my stimulus check that I received a call from the IRS. They said they owed me something like $700, so I said I would pay them back. That was it. That was the extent of the conversation. They didn’t say, “We noticed you haven’t paid your taxes in years.” That was strange. I thought to myself. Oh, I’m sure I owe you more than that.
Since then, the IRS has called me several times, but I remember the number, but I didn’t answer. Eventually that started to decrease and I stopped hearing from them at all. Ultimately, all you need to do to stop paying taxes is stop paying taxes.
Ironically, I now have a government job. They ran a background check on me, where I had to admit that I had drunk and driven several times and – yep – didn’t pay taxes. To my surprise, I was still taken by the team. The hiring manager told me I needed to figure out my financial situation. I said something like, “Yeah, I’ll get right to it,” and we haven’t talked about it since.
But it was still a wake-up call. I went to rehab a few years ago, I’m sober, Really I don’t want to lose this job. So he finally thought it was time to catch up with the IRS and take responsibility for his actions.
So in 2024 I started making up for lost time. I filed my last three taxes retroactively for 2021. I have no idea what will happen to me or how the government will react. The only communication I have had with his IRS since coming clean was a letter stating that the $70 he was supposed to get back from his 2023 paperwork would be applied to money he “owed.” The total bill is still a mystery to me, but I doubt it will amount to anything good. But one thing is for sure, now that I’m officially in the system, I’m sure I’ll hear from them soon.
I’ve done my own research on the whole tax delinquency economy. I saw an advertisement for a firm that has tax attorneys on staff who will take care of all the bad things that can happen if you don’t pay your taxes: wage garnishment, asset seizure, etc. The company said the fee for the service was $8,000. This is what I thought. If I had $8,000, I would go and pay taxes!
However, I am hopeful that the IRS will treat me with empathy. Hopefully I can get on some kind of installment plan and everything will be fine. Every April, I thought this might be the moment it all came crashing down. Sometimes I’d fill out a form in TurboTax, stare at the submit button, knowing that once I submitted the document, there was no going back. Will I get fired? Are you going to jail? But it wasn’t until the following year that those feelings subsided and I moved on. You know what seems irreplaceable to me right now?Live the rest of your life free from stress and anxiety life.
