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Business, Economics, and Taxes: Capitalism. Yay? >=(

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Kepler said:
I'm pretty sure they aren't. I thought the whole point was to break sovereign states' chokehold on exchange?
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No, the whole point of the blockchain is that everything is traceable for record keeping.

Your wallet/account is what is supposed to be anonymous. But once that’s exposed then everything you’ve ever done is known.
 
Spartanforlife4 said:
No, the whole point of the blockchain is that everything is traceable for record keeping.

Your wallet/account is what is supposed to be anonymous. But once that’s exposed then everything you’ve ever done is known.
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Yeah it would seem these people watch too many mediocre movies if they thought they could just get bitcoin and have it be hidden from the world. There are ways to do it with various encryptions and offline wallets and so on (hence why people will go looking in the trash heap when they throw out a personal drive) but if the wallet is public and connected to an internet source it is pretty easily traceable.

I mean it is on the Bitcoin web site from Pete's Sake!

Criminals Need to Do their Research

Bitcoin works with an unprecedented level of transparency that most people are not used to dealing with. All Bitcoin transactions are public, traceable, and permanently stored in the Bitcoin network. Bitcoin addresses are the only information used to define where bitcoins are allocated and where they are sent. These addresses are created privately by each user's wallets. However, once addresses are used, they become tainted by the history of all transactions they are involved with. Anyone can see the balance and all transactions of any address. Since users usually have to reveal their identity in order to receive services or goods, Bitcoin addresses cannot remain fully anonymous. As the block chain is permanent, it's important to note that something not traceable currently may become trivial to trace in the future. For these reasons, Bitcoin addresses should only be used once and users must be careful not to disclose their addresses.
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In other words...stop believing what some docu-drama tells you about how crypto is only used by criminals on the "Dark Web" and gives you total anonymity.
 
Handyman said:
Yeah it would seem these people watch too many mediocre movies if they thought they could just get bitcoin and have it be hidden from the world. There are ways to do it with various encryptions and offline wallets and so on (hence why people will go looking in the trash heap when they throw out a personal drive) but if the wallet is public and connected to an internet source it is pretty easily traceable.

I mean it is on the Bitcoin web site from Pete's Sake!

Criminals Need to Do their Research



In other words...stop believing what some docu-drama tells you about how crypto is only used by criminals on the "Dark Web" and gives you total anonymity.
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“What!?” - Matt Gaetz, probably.
 
Deutsche Gopher Fan said:
Propublica given secret trove of IRS files.

eat the rich

https://mobile.twitter.com/dicktofel/status/1402190286034542593
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Nice clickbait - I’m sure they’re going to rake in a ton with these headlines.

What we’re really talking about here is unrealized capital gains (UCG, i.e. wealth growth), which is obviously important, but different from income.

I’ve always struggled with how we should treat UCG. It’s one thing for easily divisible assets like stocks or bonds, though even in that case, I’m not all that comfortable with the idea that people should be forced to sell a portion of their portfolios just to pay taxes on the UCG. It’s a completely different story if the asset is real estate or art. An otherwise indigent person should not have to sell a family heirloom just because worldwide collectors decide that Mighty Morphin Power Rangers are back in fashion and drive up the price.

So let’s set UCG aside for now. How are these ratfuckers getting away without paying REALIZED capital gains? Jet fuel and caviar don’t come cheap. They’re clearly liquidating some assets somehow to get cash to pay for all those things - how are there enough loopholes that they’re paying no taxes on those liquidations, which should represent realized gains? That’s the first place I’d go investigate if I were in charge of the tax code.
 
I think loopholes are a huge part of this. Realizing how little they are paying due to loopholes is what I took out of it. It’s actually worse than I thought
 
Deutsche Gopher Fan said:
I think loopholes are a huge part of this. Realizing how little they are paying due to loopholes is what I took out of it. It’s actually worse than I thought
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Yep. If a billionaire’s wealth grows by $1B, she spends $20M to support her lifestyle, and she pays $1M in taxes, the (first) question should be how is she only paying 5% on her expenses, not how is she paying only .01% on her wealth growth.

.1% vs UCG should not be a mystery and is not headline worthy. The real story ought to be the 5% against expenses.
 
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LynahFan said:
Nice clickbait - I’m sure they’re going to rake in a ton with these headlines.

What we’re really talking about here is unrealized capital gains (UCG, i.e. wealth growth), which is obviously important, but different from income.

I’ve always struggled with how we should treat UCG. It’s one thing for easily divisible assets like stocks or bonds, though even in that case, I’m not all that comfortable with the idea that people should be forced to sell a portion of their portfolios just to pay taxes on the UCG. It’s a completely different story if the asset is real estate or art. An otherwise indigent person should not have to sell a family heirloom just because worldwide collectors decide that Mighty Morphin Power Rangers are back in fashion and drive up the price.

So let’s set UCG aside for now. How are these ratfuckers getting away without paying REALIZED capital gains? Jet fuel and caviar don’t come cheap. They’re clearly liquidating some assets somehow to get cash to pay for all those things - how are there enough loopholes that they’re paying no taxes on those liquidations, which should represent realized gains? That’s the first place I’d go investigate if I were in charge of the tax code.
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In Buffet's case, I doubt he has to pull that much shenanigans. He lives in a relatively modest home (assessed at about $1 million, about a quarter of which is attributable to recent renovations to add space for security - the house itself is simply a nice $750,000 home in an old money part of Omaha).

He is notoriously cheap, and he only takes a salary of $100k. I imagine he sells stock as needed to fund expenses, but it wouldn't shock me if he just accumulates a lot of unrealized capital gains.
 
LynahFan said:
Nice clickbait - I’m sure they’re going to rake in a ton with these headlines.
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Perhaps. My first thought is that the IRS has no record of what these guys actually make. Yes, they bribe politicians to lower their tax bill, but what they really do is lie and cheat and hide their assets so the IRS never has any notion of what they ought to be taxed for.
 
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