The Rich Are Different from You and Me

　　other than that they have more money, of course, as the critic Mary Colum retorted. They’ve got much better ways of hiding their income from the prying eyes of Uncle Sam:

　　One afternoon in April, six dozen wealthy Americans were entertained at a luncheon party in Midtown Manhattan, along with a special guest from Paris: Henri Loyrette, the director of the Louvre.

　　The host of the exclusive gathering was the Swiss bank UBS, whose elite private bankers built a lucrative business in recent years by discreetly tending the fortunes of American millionaires and billionaires. As the wine flowed and Mr. Loyrette spoke of the glories of France, UBS bankers courted their affluent guests.

　　But now, as the federal authorities intensify an investigation into offshore bank accounts, the secrets of this rarefied world are being dragged into the open — and UBS’s privileged clients are running scared.

　　Under pressure from the authorities, UBS is considering whether to divulge the names of up to 20,000 of its well-heeled American clients, according to people close to the inquiry, a step that would have once been unthinkable to Swiss bankers, whose traditions of secrecy date to the Middle Ages.

　　Federal investigators believe some of the clients may have used offshore accounts at UBS to hide as much as $20 billion in assets from the Internal Revenue Service. Doing so may have enabled these people to dodge at least $300 million in federal taxes on income from those assets, according to a government official connected with the investigation.

$300 million is a lot in practically everybody’s book.

Another difference is that if you stole $300 million and were caught doing it, in all likelihood you’d go to prison. These cats will pay a fine and that will probably be that. After all it would be pretty darned embarrassing if 20,000 of America’s richest ended up doing time.

富人與你我的不同

　　譯：正如評論家瑪麗`科倫姆所反駁的：當然，除去富人比我們有更多的錢，他們擁有更多的方法將自己的財富藏好，不讓像山姆叔叔那樣愛打聽的人知道。

　　四月的一個下午， 七十幾個美國有錢人受邀來到曼哈頓商業區參加午宴，其中，有一位從巴黎來的貴賓，亨瑞·羅瑞特，影片羅浮宮的導演。

　　這個高級聚會的主辦方是瑞士銀行-UBS:瑞士聯合銀行，該銀行的私人精英銀行業者在近幾年通過細心幫助美國的百萬、千萬富翁打理財產而大賺了一筆。羅瑞特一邊搖動著酒杯，一邊娓娓到來法國的光榮史，瑞銀的銀行家們奉承著他們多金的客人們。

　　但是， 現在由于聯邦當局已經加大了對于境外銀行賬戶的調查，這個鮮為人知的世界正慢慢被人所了解，以致瑞銀的特權客戶人數在減少。

　　在當局的這種壓力下， 瑞銀正在考慮是否要向此次調查的相關人士泄露多達20,000的美國貴賓名單，這個做法對瑞士銀行家們而言，是從未考慮過要做的。因為，他們這種對賬戶采取保密的傳統源自中世紀。

　　聯邦調查員們認為，有些人利用在瑞銀的國外賬戶來掩藏國內稅收局高達2千億美元的財產。據這次調查的相關政府官員說，這樣做，可以使他們能夠避免上繳因該筆財產所產生的至少3億美元稅款。

　　在實際生活中，3億美元對每個人的賬戶而言都不是一筆小數目。

　　還有一個區別就是，如果你偷了3億美元而且被當場抓住，很有可能你要去監獄了。而這些有錢的惡人只會收到一張罰單，而且可能僅次而已了。要知道，如果美國富人中的2萬人在這樣做的話，這會是非常令人尷尬又厭惡的。