Washington, D.C.-There are a lot of different hospitals and medical facilities across the nation that are receiving Medicare payments that appear not to be paying Federal or State taxes on this funding.
In the tax year 2006 alone it is estimated by the Federal government that recipients of Medicare reimbursement failed to pay more then $2 billion dollars in Federal Taxes.
The Federal Government Accountability Office is the investigative arm of Congress and they are reporting that the problem of avoiding taxes on Medicare and government payments appears to be getting worse.
The number provided by the GAO are also believed to be understated because it didn’t not include all Medicare providers, only a select segment that are being traced because they apparently didn’t file tax forms for the last one or two years.
Lawmakers have been working to solve the problem and they are pressing Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services to adopt the Federal Payment Levy Program.
This would allow the Internal Revenue Service to act proactively and to hold back different government payments for those facilities that flaunt the law and refuse to pay taxes that are owned on Medicare and Medicaid payments.