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The part in bold is an opinion that not everyone will share. However, the risk of being audited is completely objective meaning it can be logically argued just like any other poker problem.


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That's really my point. Some things should not be quantified like "other poker problems."

For example: let's say that you've cashed out of your game at a local cardroom and are walking toward the exit. You see a guy with a $5,000 stack of 100s sticking way out of his back pocket. You believe there is a 98% chance that you could pick the guy's pocket and get way with it. If caught, you will have to pay triple that amount as a fine, $15,000 (criminal charges are an impossibility in my example). This is an easily quantifiable situation, where stealing the money is +EV. But would the average 2+2er do it? I'd bet not, because (I hope) the average 2+2er believes that stealing is wrong.

All I'm saying is that it's somewhat surprising to me that amid a flurry of posts about the IRS and taxes, no one has said simply, "you should pay your taxes because it's the right thing to do."

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$5000 in some guy's back pocket rightfully belongs to that guy. It's kind of hard to dispute that. (At least vis a vis some random person walking up behind him and seeing the money)

Does 1/3 of what I make this year rightfully belong to the U.S. government? At the very least this matter is open for debate from a moral standpoint. In fact, many would argue that paying taxes at these rates is manifestly immoral for a wide variety reasons. Some people view paying taxes under the current IRC as each individual paying their rightful share of the cost necessary to run society, while others look at paying taxes under the current IRC as being shaken down by people with lots of guns and lots of cages who are just going piss the money away anyways.