Tax Man Probes Scores of Web Professionals, Celebrities

Published on 2019/04/14 | Source

The National Tax Service is investigating 176 celebrities, professional athletes, landlords, famous YouTubers and other rich and famous people, it said Wednesday.

This is the first time that the NTS is homing in on newly emerging professionals who make a lot of money in as yet poorly regulated ways. The targets include YouTubers, IT professionals and internet storage providers.

But 47 are from more established professions that are currently enjoying a boom like vets, realtors and financial consultants, while 20 are celebrities and professional athletes, 39 professionals such as doctors and lawyers, and 35 landlords.

Last year the NTS investigated 881 people and imposed W695.9 billion in punitive taxes (US$1=W1,140). According to the NTS, the number of self-employed people with an annual income of W500 million or over rose from 2,697 in 2007 to 11,898 in 2017, and their declared income jumped from W2.72 trillion to W11.90 trillion.

There were some 100,000 people in the established professions like doctors, lawyer and accountants as of 2017, and their average income per year was W782 million for doctors, W412 million for patent attorneys, W387 million for lawyers, and W329 million for accountants.