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List:       cryptography
Subject:    Congressional tax commission frets about crypto
From:       Declan McCullagh <declan () well ! com>
Date:       1999-06-23 3:51:52
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http://www.wired.com/news/print_version/politics/story/20355.html?wnpg=all

Some of the testimony warned of the dangers posed to governments by
uncontrolled technology, a common complaint in the nation's capital. 

Specifically, presenters here at William and Mary College fretted that
encryption technology, combined with the ability to buy and sell anywhere in
the world, could allow consumers to skirt sales taxes. 

Maintaining taxes at current levels poses "an increasingly difficult problem
for tax administrators as a result of new technologies," said Joseph Guttentag
of the US Treasury Department. 

He warned that Americans may seek to evade high income taxes by moving online
and offshore. 

"We are going to closely monitor the relationship of tax havens to electronic
commerce... Encrypted [communications] create opportunities for untraceable
transfer of assets and other activities that will hinder audits" 

Guttentag, who appeared in Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin's stead, is a
senior
adviser in the department's Office of Tax Policy and chairman of an
Organization
for Economic Cooperation and Development tax committee. He said the OECD
should
become more involved in eliminating "other forms of harmful tax competition." 

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