Please explain how people without social security numbers pay federal taxes.
Thanks in advance.
Please explain why an illegal worker would file federal tax returns and pay federal taxes knowing they would expose themselves to detention and deportation by ICE.
Thanks in advance.
Well gosh. Here I am sitting at the northern end of the Salinas Valley, a place filled with agriculture, and I am surrounded by artichokes. So lemme tell you how it works...
All the farms here pay by check. Maybe some pay under the table but that is a huge risk because the state (California) and the Feds (IRS) are on the lookout for this kind of thing. Fines are issued, land can be seized, and people go to jail. To get around this stolen SSI numbers are used. There is a serious industry based around the cashing of these payroll checks that has quietly taken root in the state. There are supermarkets designed for the migrant community featuring goods, and name brands from south of the border. Prominently positioned at the front of the store is a check-cashing window where farm workers line up to cash their paychecks for a
small fee. The groceries in these stores tend to run well above the discount chains, but the farm workers still shop there.
So at each step, taxes are paid. Payroll tax, SSI, unemployment, and sales taxes. Just like everyone else in the US, they are taxes here and there whenever they make a purchase.
Not sure how they get away with the fake social security number thing, but the black market is robust, and numbers are changed often.
And ICE isn't as good as the right wing thinks it is as far as rounding up illegals. Some of this is due to lack of local law enforcement cooperation, some is due to the systemic problems between Social Security Admin communicating fraud to ICE, as the FBI. and Secret Service get first crack at such cases. ICE is usually brought in as an afterthought.
Maybe read some Steinbeck sometime. Nothing has changed since the Grapes of Wrath.