Mixed feelings on this one. Obviously that’s a fuckload of money for an informant. Without knowing everything he helped inform on it’s hard to gauge if it’s “worth it” (but I suspect no, it is not).
But also I find it weird that someone paid with tax dollars would need to turn around and pay taxes. Like the government is just sitting there going “one for you, and one for me”.
Maybe paying local/state taxes but not federal makes more sense?
Wouldn’t that be the same for all federal workers? They get paid from the government and then pay federal taxes.
But also I find it weird that someone paid with tax dollars would need to turn around and pay taxes.
So government employees shouldn’t have to pay income tax?
Make it make sense.
They’re observing that the government gives them X wages and then takes back Y taxes, when they could just skip that step by paying them less in X wages. Not much difference between making 100k and paying 15k than just making 85k and paying 0.
Taxes are not as simple as “X% of your income goes to the government”. You cannot just calculate it at payment time, only estimate it
I was surprised to find out that informants have to pay taxes on their govt money too.
“The DEA paid Zapata, a professional money launderer, $3.8 million from 2015-2020 for his work as a confidential informant, court records show.”
