Assemblyman Lee Hyung-seok: "A 'Detention' System Should Be Introduced for High-Amount and Habitual Local Tax Delinquents"

‘Partial Amendment to the Local Tax Collection Act’ Representative Proposal

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Yoon Jamin] A bill has been submitted to detain high-amount and habitual tax delinquents for up to 30 days.

On the 19th, Rep. Lee Hyung-seok (Democratic Party of Korea, Gwangju Buk-gu Eul) announced that he has introduced the “Partial Amendment to the Local Tax Collection Act” as the main proposer, which allows local tax delinquents who have failed to pay local taxes without justifiable reasons to be detained for up to 30 days until payment is made.

This is to enhance the effectiveness of collecting delinquent amounts from high-amount delinquents such as Jeon Du-hwan, who has not paid local taxes amounting to 1 billion KRW for a long period.

As of August, there are 17,703 habitual delinquents who have failed to pay local taxes three or more times, with over one year elapsed and a total delinquent amount exceeding 10 million KRW, totaling approximately 790.3 billion KRW.

However, under current law, sanctions against high-amount malicious local tax delinquents are limited to public disclosure of their names, and according to Rep. Lee, most high-amount tax delinquents like Jeon Du-hwan have the ability to pay but still fail to pay local taxes.

Rep. Lee said, “Those who have the ability to pay but do not comply must be strongly punished,” adding, “To realize tax justice and a fair society and to enhance the effectiveness of delinquent tax collection, the ‘Local Tax Collection Act’ must be amended to impose strong sanctions.”

Currently, the National Tax Service has introduced and is implementing a “detention order” system that allows detention in a detention center or jail for up to 30 days for malicious national tax delinquents owing 200 million KRW or more.

Rep. Lee emphasized, “In the case of local taxes, if a person with the ability to pay has failed to pay local taxes three or more times, with each delinquency exceeding one year from the date of occurrence, and the total delinquent local tax amount exceeds 10 million KRW, a detention system to hold the delinquent in a detention center must be strongly promoted and enforced as a sanction.”

He continued, “Failing to pay taxes is a criminal act equivalent to tax evasion,” and “This is an antisocial crime that causes distrust and public outrage in the community, so it must be punished with a firmer resolve to prevent high-amount delinquents from gaining a foothold in our society.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.