That kinda just means that tax evasion is still not totally precise but I still think it's closer to the mark than money laundering. They can both be either illegal or legal in similar ways and, indeed, the same otherwise-legal actions can be seen as either or both in different contexts. It's just a matter of semantics whether one's (seemingly legal) actions are better labeled as one or the other, and the tax evasion seems to more sense in this context.
Money laundering refers to making "dirty" money (profits from criminal activity) "clean" by introducing it into the general financial system in a way that doesn't easily trace it back to the crime. The way Breaking Bad used the car wash business to launder the drug money is a good example: the car wash business model doesn't have easy means of verifying the volume of legitimate transactions (e.g. inventory) so the owner can just arbitrarily perform fraudulent transactions with the dirty money. I presume it's far more complex when actual banks are involved but it's the same basic concept of making dirty money appear legitimate through some transaction.
Tax evasion is just not paying taxes. Whether or not someone avoids paying taxes through loopholes is only really a legal technicality that I don't think most people care about when discussing this topic. Corporations avoid paying the tax they should and that can be reasonably described as tax evasion even if it's not strictly illegal tax evasion.
That kinda just means that tax evasion is still not totally precise but I still think it's closer to the mark than money laundering. They can both be either illegal or legal in similar ways and, indeed, the same otherwise-legal actions can be seen as either or both in different contexts. It's just a matter of semantics whether one's (seemingly legal) actions are better labeled as one or the other, and the tax evasion seems to more sense in this context.
Money laundering refers to making "dirty" money (profits from criminal activity) "clean" by introducing it into the general financial system in a way that doesn't easily trace it back to the crime. The way Breaking Bad used the car wash business to launder the drug money is a good example: the car wash business model doesn't have easy means of verifying the volume of legitimate transactions (e.g. inventory) so the owner can just arbitrarily perform fraudulent transactions with the dirty money. I presume it's far more complex when actual banks are involved but it's the same basic concept of making dirty money appear legitimate through some transaction.
Tax evasion is just not paying taxes. Whether or not someone avoids paying taxes through loopholes is only really a legal technicality that I don't think most people care about when discussing this topic. Corporations avoid paying the tax they should and that can be reasonably described as tax evasion even if it's not strictly illegal tax evasion.