By G. Palaitsakis
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Greek tax authorities have confirmed unpaid taxes and corresponding fines of up to 742 million euros from audits conducted on a mere 4.7 percent of Greek citizens found on a trio of lists of depositors in overseas banks or recorded to have wire transferred large sums of money out of the country prior to the imposition of capital controls in June 2015.
The figure is impressive, given that it is derived from only a very small fraction of the names found on the three lists, which have often been employed as a "political battering rams" by more populist-minded politicians in Greece to point to extensive tax evasion by the "economic elite".
According to figures submitted to Parliament by the relevant deputy finance minister and by the independent public revenues authorities, in answer to a tabled question by a main opposition deputy, from early 2014 to the end of 2017 tax authorities completed 1,784 audits out of 37,650 cases of Greek taxpayers that appear on the so-called "Lagarde" and Borjans" lists, as well as a registry of bank transfers of capital abroad.
