Who Cheats?

CNN Money reports on a fascinating study of tax cheaters. For some reason, considerable numbers of people admit that they cheat on their income taxes. This study tried to assemble information about who they are:

The typical American tax cheat is male, single and under the age of 45. …
These percentages were all significantly higher for the self-proclaimed cheaters than for the non-cheaters, indicating that Americans who cheat on their taxes are much more likely to fall into these three categories than those who don’t, the survey found.

The study didn’t ask about political preferences, but from other sociological data I’m sure most of them are Democrats, too. People who cheat on their taxes are likely to cheat on other things as well:

And it’s not just taxes that they are dishonest about.
“Their willingness to cheat is not limited to their taxes but spans a wide range of situations and behavior where they are looking to get away with something,” said James Lou, U.S. chief strategist at DDB.
… Self-proclaimed cheaters are also much more likely to keep the wrong change given to them by a cashier, to ask a friend to pretend to be a former boss for a reference check and to lie about their income to qualify for government aid.
Many of them also said they would wear an outfit once and return it, file false insurance claims, keep money they see someone drop on the floor, or lie about finding something inappropriate in their food just to get a free meal.
Tax cheaters are even more likely to steal money from a child. The survey found that while only 3% of non-cheaters would ever take money from their child’s piggy bank, 28% of cheaters said they would.

Whoa! Now we know they’re Democrats. Stealing from our kids is their core fiscal strategy. Sure, they call it borrowing, but do they have any intention of paying it back? Of course not.
All of this is prelude to the study’s most interesting finding: people who lie, cheat and steal do so because they think they are morally superior:

Many cheaters also try to justify their behavior. Far more tax cheats said they are ‘overall better people’ and that they are ‘special and deserve to be treated that way’, compared to the people who said they don’t cheat.

That is, I think, a wonderful insight into the liberal mind. I’m a morally superior person–how do I know that? Because I’m a liberal, of course!–so it’s OK if I lie, cheat or steal because I am “special” and “deserve to be treated that way.” I think that mentality explains a lot of what we see in Washington, in Madison, Wisconsin, and wherever liberals predominate.
UPDATE: A Facebook commenter points out that this probably explains why President Obama had such a hard time assembling a cabinet of people who pay their taxes.

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