Tax evasion in the United States unlawful gains as income when filing annual tax returns (see e.g., "James v. United States") although such income is typically not reported. Suspected lawbreakers, most famously Al Capone, have been successfully prosecuted for tax evasion when there was insufficient evidence to try them for their non-tax related crimes. Reporting illegal income as earned legitimately may be illegal money laundering. In the United States, the IRS estimate of the 2001 tax gap was $345 billion. For 2006, the tax gap is estimated to be $450 billion. A more recent study estimates the 2008 tax gap in the range of $450 to
UBS tax evasion controversies media credit Birkenfeld's act with affecting a sea change in Swiss banking. After Birkenfeld's award, the Swiss newspaper "Blick" claimed, "Birkenfeld was a blessing for the Swiss financial industry," in that his revelations helped accelerate the industry's transition away from its reliance on "dirty" money by dooming the bank secrecy laws that enabled tax evasion. Birkenfeld has compared the Swiss banking industry with gangsters. "In essence, bank secrecy is analogous to criminal racketeering — and the Swiss government, along with every Swiss private banker, is a co-conspirator." In response to the report and the FBI investigation, UBS announced that it