Is this common? I knew a guy who had the same mindset. I ended up paying him in cash for some work, he was convinced that if he made any money in a traditional role it would be instantly garnished.
And being paid $1k and assuming they'd have $1k and then discovering they only had $500 because of garnishment tells them "don't accept checks, cash is the only safe method".
And then it's not a step much further to be "it's not worth setting up social security because it'll all be taken".
People forget that there is a population group where fines are MORE HARMFUL than jail time. At least with jail, you can serve your time and be done.
A while back a guy destroyed a vehicle of mine and drove off. Per criminal law in my jurisdiction, he should have served at least 45 days for that offense. But it isn't like that would ever give me my property back. It's also unlikely to deter that particular crime in the population.
Another person needed an ID. In order to apply for the ID they needed a birth certificate. In order to apply for it they had to fill out the application, mail it with money, and then have a permanent place to have the birth certificate mailed an unknown amount of time later. At which point they then needed to apply for the ID and go through that process.
Your contractor’s actions makes a some twisted sense to me as he’s still receiving ‘undisclosed’ cash. The homeless veteran doesn’t make any sense to me as he was not receiving the social security funds at all.
Paying people under the table has a lot of potential liability for you and it almost always catches up with them. Especially now it’s just not viable to live off the grid (e.g. hoping you don’t get sick isn’t effective) and all this does is ensure that the amount they owe the IRS is unaffordable when the bill finally arrives, usually when their earning potential has gone down.
That isn't the same thing.
