Death and Taxes: Guess Which Jim Thorpe Was Avoiding

by Ryan Ballengee on Sep 23, 2009 2:00 PM EDT Comment 3 comments

Champions Tour Jim Thorpe is one of the more popular on the circuit with his homemade swing and casual, entertaining demeanor. Unfortunately for Thorpe, popularity doesn't mean an exemption from paying income taxes. Thorpe hasn't been paying for the period between 2002 and 2004, and the Federales have caught him.

Thorpe plead guilty to two counts of tax evasion on Tuesday. As the AP notes, he could face a two year jail term and a fine up to $4.1 million. Thorpe has said that he was not intentionally avoiding paying taxes.

I don't know whether or not Thorpe didn't pick up a copy of Turbotax or what, but that's not an excuse to owe the IRS a couple million bucks in taxes.

It's a shame this happened, but as - and I can't believe I'm saying this - Colin Cowherd has said, there are a lot of benefits to being a celebrity. Just so happens that celebrities are also used to make an example for the general public.

0 recs | Comment 3 comments | Share

Story-email Email Printer Print

Comments

You know…I THOUGHT Thorpe was living an awful long time. :-)

Definitely a shame that he got caught up in so many bad deals and investments that he has come to this point.

"this ball will fit in that fairway"

by courtgolf on Sep 23, 2009 2:02 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

The Way I See it...

Jim Thorpe simply wasn’t as “well-advised” as other (much wealthier) Americans who don’t pay what they should in taxes …and get away with it.

We live in a democracy where as long as you’re smart about it, minimizing what you pay in taxes is a badge of honor, as opposed to a blatant shirking of one’s patriotic duty. In the minds of many, hiding wealth and evading taxes is only wrong if you’re careless or unlucky enough to be caught.

by golfgirl on Sep 23, 2009 5:13 PM EDT reply actions 1 recs

Pssst – Jim Thorpe had millions dollars – you don’t get millions in the tax hole making $20k a year – he could afford more than one financial and tax advisor – nice try on the wealth card. He chose the advice he took.

We do NOT live in a democracy. Where did you learn that ? (quick definition of democracy – two wolves and a sheep deciding what’s for dinner)

Our tax code has gone from simple add on taxes before FDR, to an unmanagable, un-understandable set of VOLUMES that are now less about bringing in dollars to run a limited federal government and more about controlling behavior and votes.

Before WWII, we didn’t have paycheck withholding. It wasn’t until then that they figured out that they could take a little out each month and people wouldn’t miss it as much as when they had to sit down at the end of the year and write one check for the whole shmeer, which kept people involved in what was going on in Washington.

"this ball will fit in that fairway"

by courtgolf on Sep 24, 2009 10:11 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs