98% of Greek Pool Owners Lie on Their Taxes... Blame The Speculators?

98% of Greek pool owners lied on their taxes.  It's true. It's not just some evil speculator hyperbole I made up to sink Greece (note: I have no position in any sort of Greece interests) - it's just one of the real reasons why Greece has a massive solvency problem.  From the NY Times:

"ATHENS — In the wealthy, northern suburbs of this city, where summer temperatures often hit the high 90s, just 324 residents checked the box on their tax returns admitting that they owned pools. 

So tax investigators studied satellite photos of the area — a sprawling collection of expensive villas tucked behind tall gates — and came back with a decidedly different number: 16,974 pools. 

That kind of wholesale lying about assets, and other eye-popping cases that are surfacing in the news media here, points to the staggering breadth of tax dodging that has long been a way of life here. Such evasion has played a significant role in Greece’s debt crisis, and as the country struggles to get its financial house in order, it is going after tax cheats as never before."

Simple math:  16,974 houses had pools.  Only 324 residents admitted to owning a pool.  Thus, 16,650 pools were left out of the count... that's 98%.  And oh, just in case anyone is thinking, "hey Kid Dynamite - don't be an idiot - maybe those other 16,650 people aren't required to file tax returns,"  well - I looked into that, and found this: everyone in Greece has to file a tax return, regardless of income:

"One of the first things you should do when you decide to settle in Greece, or buy property, is register for a Tax number (A.F.M. – pronounced aa – fee - mee)....Once you have an AFM (Tax) number, you are registered with the Greek authorities and are required to submit a yearly tax return in Greece (Form E1) regardless of income, i.e. even if it is a nil return."

The NY Times article continues:

"Various studies, including one by the Federation of Greek Industries last year, have estimated that the government may be losing as much as $30 billion a year to tax evasion — a figure that would have gone a long way to solving its debt problems."

Ah hah... So perhaps Greece's problem isn't that "speculators" are ruining their borrowing ability - perhaps the problem is that Greece's own citizens are lying to their government, depriving them of the tax revenue they desperately need to pay back their debts...

-KD