{"id":14054,"date":"2025-06-25T17:22:08","date_gmt":"2025-06-25T17:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/14054\/"},"modified":"2025-06-25T17:22:08","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T17:22:08","slug":"what-should-i-do-if-i-know-someone-is-committing-fraud","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/14054\/","title":{"rendered":"What should I do if I know someone is committing fraud?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pay Dirt is Slate\u2019s money advice column. Have a question? <\/strong>Send it to Kristin and Ilyce here<\/strong><\/a>. (It\u2019s anonymous!)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dear Pay Dirt,\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

My nephew is quick to brag about finding ways to push the limits to save money on taxes.<\/p>\n

But I recently found out, via public property tax records, that he claims that he is fully military disabled (unable to work) and therefore exempt from home property taxes. But he does work\u2014he\u2019s a dentist!<\/p>\n

He had a Navy scholarship for dental school and served his payback as a military base dentist. When that was done, he opened up his own private dental practice and has worked there full-time since. I don\u2019t know if he is telling the same story to receive disability benefits for himself, his wife, and two children, since this is not public information.<\/p>\n

I doubt his sweet wife or my super religious sister knows what he is doing. My wife says don\u2019t get involved, so I haven\u2019t. But should I?<\/p>\n

\u2014Looking Away From Fraud<\/p>\n

Dear Looking Away,<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s understandable to feel uncomfortable when someone close to you seems to be bending the rules, especially when it involves something serious like disability benefits and taxes. As frustrating as it may be, my take is that ultimately, this is your nephew\u2019s ethical and legal dilemma to handle\u2014not yours. That doesn\u2019t mean you can\u2019t say something about it, though, because this kind of fraud could really come back to haunt him.<\/p>\n

If this really bothers you, or if you\u2019re genuinely concerned that this might come back to bite him or his family, the best place to start is an honest conversation with your nephew.<\/p>\n

Next time he brags about taking advantage of the system in this way, tell him that it makes you uncomfortable to hear it and that he should really be concerned that he\u2019s going to get caught\u2014many people lose their entire livelihoods because of this kind of fraud. If you really want to get involved, that\u2019s the way to do it.<\/p>\n

In short, I\u2019m with your wife on this one. You can\u2019t control other people\u2019s moral choices or carry their burdens. Speak your mind if it really bothers you, but then let him make his own bed. His questionable decisions shouldn\u2019t become your headache.<\/p>\n

\u2014Kristin<\/p>\n

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    The latest sex, parenting, and money advice from our columnists delivered to your inbox three times a week.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pay Dirt is Slate\u2019s money advice column. Have a question? Send it to Kristin and Ilyce here. (It\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":14055,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[600,64,255,1087,5597,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-14054","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-advice","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-personal-finance","11":"tag-relationships","12":"tag-slate-plus","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114745163386054891","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14054","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14054"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14054\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14055"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14054"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14054"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14054"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}