Originally Posted by Janke

So were the deductions taken by your accountant legal or not? I believe the IRS requires that you take all legal deductions, but you should check that out with an accountant.

What you are talking about doing is not that much different from just creating a business profit that doesn't exist for the purposes of earning credits that you don't really qualify for. It is like a small business paying a paycheck to a foreign born family member as a "consultant" for ten years for the sole purpose of qualifying for a lifetime retirement SSA check. This "consultant" had no expertise in the business enterprise, but was paid anyway.

SSA has the authority to disallow fraudulent tax returns and remove the credits from earnings records. The amendments are a red flag to a diligent bureaucrat and you may or may not actually get the credits that you paid for by amending the tax return. You actually have to have the profit in your business and it sounds like you did not.