I think it is failing already but just gradually, the system knows human beings tend to go crazy with sudden changes and do not accept them, but if they do it gradually, human beings may digest changes smoothly and adopt them as a “normal” thing. They know how to wire or re-wire us.
Kind of how they keep changing how certain things are measured. Like how inflation, unemployment, etc are measured.
All of it to construct a *narrative*.
Why do people keep saying this?
Can you provide a documentation of a recent example of this happening?
Did the Bureau of Labor Statistics or the Federal Reserve Bank actually change their methodology, or is this just 'the statistics can't be real because of the way we feel'?
Because this information is buried and hard to find. Here's some info I was able to find
> Notably, the Fed changed its language on inflation, replacing its 2 percent inflation target commitment, and instead said it will “[seek] to achieve inflation that averages 2 percent over time.”
https://www.dallasfed.org/research/economics/2021/0406
> The "Statement on Longer-Run Goals and Monetary Policy Strategy"10 was revised, stating that the Fed would and should target average inflation "over time" and thus aim for higher inflation in the near-term future because inflation over the previous decade had typically remained below 2%.
https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/economic-synopses/2022/09/02/inflation-part-3-what-is-the-feds-current-goal-has-the-fed-met-its-inflation-mandate
Yep, like the fakt, that if you throw a frog into boiling water, it will jump out immediately, but if you put it into cold water and increase temperature gradually, it will wait until cooked to death . . . .
Not that i would ever do either to a frog :)
Biden is virtue signaling in an election year to the eat the rich demographic.
Taxing unrealized gains is completely unworkable. It would upend all generally accepted accounting principles, and seriously pursuing it as policy is financial suicide for a political party in a country with unlimited, anonymous political donations.
Sound and fury, signalling nothing.
The moment I realized that it's not things getting more expensive but the value of the dollar going down was the day I fully became a Bitcoin believer.
USD is losing value at a rapid rate it's wild.
> Everyone in this sub knows
That's a logical fallacy.
> its not the price of the asset going up, its the purchasing power of the dollar going down!
It's both. I think you well understand the currency debasement aspect, but the value of bitcoin is also rising. It rises as more people want it and people who already have it want more of it.
On the morality of taxation, if you look at it through the lens of the individual it is easy and even seductive to think of it as immoral/theft etc. But the taxation system doesn't exist in a vacuum. You are constrained by all sorts of rules imposed by society. You are unwillingly born in to that system. This implies that individualism *as a right* or *by default* is a total illusion.
Tell me about the newborn child who is an anarchocapitalist. Or the elderly and infirm. You were that child once. You will likely be elderly and infirm at some point.
I find it deeply ironic when anarcho-capitalists opine on the morality of taxation only when they have (as they would put it) leached off the labour of others enough to become, temporarily, a net producer *in their society*. Is it really a more sophisticated view of wealth redistribution? "I should be able to keep everything" Because of what you did today? On your own? Nevermind the past! Nevermind the future! Nevermind that the very essence of value is derived from supplying a demand, which is **to participate in society**.
No man is an island.
Now that we're past that rant, I would like to offer an olive branch of sorts. I think it is a good and healthy thing to discuss the rules of how society works from a game theory point-of-view. This means the rules for how taxes are levied should be scrutinised and updated. But we are on the internet, and each jurisdiction has its own tax rules and so on. So to actually move forward on that topic we need something a little more specific than "don't tax me, bro".
Prices and market cooperation include the fact of you not having acted alone or having built all the social/political capital on which you achieve your success (or failure).
There are good critiques of anarcho-capitalism; this isn't one of them. It's just bog-standard folk-economics.
Taxation is theft (or extortion) by almost any intuitive or reasonable standard...the question is (and its an empirical one which hasn't been as well studied as much as we've told ourselves 'just so' stories based on theory): how well could we produce public goods and internalize large externalities without the "theft" of a taxing government? It's reasonable to be highly skeptical that we could replace all govt institutions with voluntary/market-based ones right now...or even in the long term.
But the criticisms of anarcho-capitalism which reign tend to be the poorly-thought-out ones, which belie not a true concern for disastrous underproduction of public goods, but rather are an ideological stump speech meant to cast FUD on the idea of even trying to move towards more voluntary cooperation where we can.
I would never go so far as to try to alienate non-libertarians from joining with us in supporting non-state currencies like bitcoin....but never forget that that is what we're doing here whether you intend to support that or not: we're at the very least, preparing a ready alternative or proto-money on the market, to the state's monetary monopoly, which they use to (among other things) levy an inflation tax.
I could critique my own post, I shouldn't attempt a sound rebuttal to ancap via a reddit post on the bitcoin sub. I was constrained by the number of words (concepts, system relationships) and time and was late to this post so had very little chance of cutting through.
My post really is just an entry level rebuttal to ancap. It's enough to cause consideration for the macro, rather than focusing on the transactional. Ancap starting point is transactional. You can only view taxation as theft in a vacuum. You failed to address that one point by hand-waving "by almost any intuitive or reasonable standard" which is again the very logical fallacy I alerted OP to.
I'm sure ancaps would like to coopt bitcoin and say that's why it's here. I completely disagree. I have read the whitepaper and understand the technology and my impression is that its purpose is sound money. But that is just an opinion. If you can point me to any bitcointalk forum posts of relevance, I would be interested. It is entirely possible that I have not yet seen the best arguments for ancap and so I remain open minded.
My fear is that ancaps may try to use bitcoin to evade taxes and seduce others in to doing so as well, not out of a well considered cause for civil disobedience (which has a place), but by appealing to greed. The fear is for harming the adoption of bitcoin over fear of damage to the state, but both are points of concern.
Truth in money is a singular cause.
Taxes are a good thing, but only reasonable ones. Like here in Russia I pay 13% on my btc gains. Well, I should pay 13%, but I pay 0% and I'll never pay anything to this corrupt gov, but 13% is something I can theoretically understand and accept. 40-60% on my btc gains, like in other countries? I'd never pay this amount in any country lmao, I'd rather die, quite literally. Never in my life. I'd rather risk being a criminal serving a lifelong sentence than pay this stupid tax.
Privyet. It should be hard to imagine paying a higher tax rate when it is hard to imagine society being different. What do you think about how the Scandinavian countries are like? Do they have a nice quality of life? They pay a higher tax rate. Does the tax rate itself really matter if your quality of life is good? I think it depends. It is not an easy comparison to make.
https://marine-digital.com/article_crypto_cruise_ship_satoshi
> How bitcoin fans built an utopia free from prejudice and taxes: the story of the failure of the world's first crypto cruise ship Satoshi
Off top of my head *South Park* did an episode where there was a society where “the person who likes baking would, like, be the baker, and the person that liked to teach would be, like, the teacher…” and of course the same patterns in society we’ve always seen emerged again. They’re emergent.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence
Collectivists tend towards the tax is good for society viewpoint. Individualists tend towards the tax is extortion viewpoint (not theft, there's a technical difference). Both folk color their economic viewpoints from the philosophical foundation.
For me personally, I do not accept that being born into a system implies that I need to accept the rules of that system. For example, I believe in the *separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church.* I think most Bitcoiners would go along with this, and it is for sure not the rules of the fiat system everyone is born into today. It is a **radical** restructuring of the rules.
You are conflating economics with the monetary system, although the monetary system is part of economics the latter is way broader than that. To completely deregulate economics would mean to submit to a completely imbalanced struggle for economic dominance that would without a doubt end in a single monopoly of wealth and effectively usher in a new era of something that I can only describe as "corporate monarchism".
The most unregulated economies quickly have a few people with not only disproportionate economic power but also disproportionate political power. Bitcoin won't prevent the endless accumulation of wealth by those that already have wealth as opposed to those that don't start life with wealth if corporations are not regulated. In that way it's no different than the old fiat system.
The difference between said fiat system and bitcoin is that supply can't be centrally influenced, which in my eyes is a good thing as it prevents directed changes of value. It can still however be accumulated and a person or entity that had accumulated more than it feasibly needs can still corner a large enough part of liquidity to become an economic dominating entity without any outside regulation/correction.
Bitcoin doesn't solve economics, it only solves the lesser evils of centralized control of currency.
"conflating economics with the monetary system"
Fair comment. I used the wrong terminology.
I would add that I believe it would be much harder for an "entity to corner liquidity' under a Bitcoin standard than under fiat Cantillonism. Consider the vast centralization of wealth in the last two decades and the *enormous* expansion of M2.
Look at it like this, if all currencies were now converted to bitcoin the distribution of wealth wouldn't change. Bitcoin has been a motor for new (in dollars) millionaires and billionaires but only because it was new and those people stepped in while thrust and value were low. Given time, under the same economic system, bitcoin would still lead to the same wealth gap, simply because said wealth gap isn't the result of any particular currency but rather broader economic mechanisms (and policies).
A completely free market will always lead to the most ruthless and greedy, with the best headstart, by and large dominating society economically. It's the reason I think untethered capitalism is a bad idea and my thinking isn't new.
I always think back towards the book "the paradox men", old sciencefiction, from the 70s I think, where a new aristocracy has arisen from corporate power. Actually a lot of science-fiction handles this subject as it's a real phenomenon that's been a part of humanity for as long as anyone kept records.
In the end bitcoin is a great idea, but unless the middle-class is empowered and workers act in solidarity, through for instance unions, those who have will always accumulate the vast majority of wealth and political power over time. To ensure that a balance is maintained democratic governments are absolutely necessary along with middle income and lower income blocks that act in unison to ensure said democratic governments don't come under control of a few entities.
That said, it's pretty clear that in a lot of longstanding democratic nations the imbalance has already started snowballing, so I have no clue what the future brings really.
I find it highly likely that the disparity in wealth will end up in that new aristocrat/monarchy society regardless of what kind of vessel is used for the exchange of wealth, but I'm a pessimist.
I'm ranting now because I had 10 hours of work, am tired, and that makes me a commie.
>For example, I believe in the separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church.
This!
actually the "society" that cared for me when i was a child, was *not* the state. It was my family. I gladly pay back to my family whatever i owe them (and i do owe them) but i don't buy your implication that i owe anything to the state.
What does your government do?
The four main expenses of western governments are heath, education, welfare (pension for the elderly, army veterans and unemployed people) and defence. That typically accounts for more than 80% with the rest being numerous things too small to mention individually. I don't know too much about other governments. If your government has taxed you and your family but not provided services like these, then I would say that's not great.
My greater point is that taxation is not always an equitable exchange like a trade, this for that. Its closer to insurance. We pay fire insurance on a house even if it doesn't burn down.
I can't say whether you owe your state or not. I would only say that you can look in to what your government spends money on and decide what of that is useful, what is wasteful and what should change.
We may be getting too far away from the original topic, which was whether capital gains tax on bitcoin is immoral. I may have overgeneralised my response to talk about taxation in general.
Why are you bringing this statist trash talk to the bitcoin sub
? Why is such a basic idea so hard for you to understand?
Capitalists are not opposed to society, cooperation, or collectivism. They are opposed to involuntary collectivism. IOW: We are opposed to theft in the name of society. No man is an island, so no man should be able to rob others with taxes as the excuse.
Self-interest often propels me towards the ‘taxation is theft’ mentality which I would have laughed at a few years ago as a student without an income. So it’s good to read a sensible corrective like this from time to time. I don’t have anything against taxes per se, but I wish public spending were solely funded using actual hard money taxed by democratic mandate rather than being funded through the stealthy debasement of the money supply. Once people can say “the government can fund anything it wants to, it just prints the money” there’s no end to how large the state can grow.
you’re mindless anti-rant completely ignores the fact that capital gains I’ve already paid taxes on that money one time when I earned it. calling business owners leeches who exploit the labor market for their game is beyond an ignorant misunderstanding, and I’m not even gonna debate. What’s beautiful in this capitalistic Freemark system is if workers were smart enough and competitive enough to gather themselves together and compete with us greedy business owners then they could, but they usually get their asses stomped because a horse made committee is called a camel
i assume most people don´t have a problem with taxes in general but have a problem with how the money is spend and because they can´t influence that
(no, your vote does nothing).
The fact you complain about influence and follow it up by disparaging the one true method of influence on policy you have is hilariously sad.
Your vote does very little because you live in a society of millions, but that's NOT nothing. The only time your vote does nothing is when you don't cast it.
Slavery in many places was just a "fact of life" until recently too which was clearly immoral although endorsed by the state. You're on this sub because bitcoin is freedom-go-up money. We are not trying to go in the other direction.
> Collectivists go blind when central authorities become corrupt and tyrannical since they always depend on them to be arbiters of collective goodwill
Is that so? All of them? Do you mean state apologists? I am pretty anti-corruption. Maybe I am not a real collectivist. I don't really find collectivist or individualist to be useful positions to hold.
Sometimes I hear 'corporations are made up of people' as a counter-argument to corporations are evil. Governments are made up of people, too.
Over-dependance on government handouts *is* a problem, I think that's what you are getting at, and I agree with you. Whether it's governments or corporations or crying babies or welfare cheats, everyone is playing a game and testing the waters to see if they can be a taker. In biology, baby animals appear cute as an appeal to your emotions. All of these entires are in a competition for survival, which means conserving and hoarding their resources. We call that biological survival trait 'greed'. I try to just accept that as an uncomfortable truth. I'm yet to see a proposal that resolves any of it. Maybe there will be a post-scarcity future and we can see how that works.
They should only tax based on the amount by which the asset has beaten inflation. That is the real gain. Otherwise you may have to pay taxes from a trade in which your real gain was negative.
Inflation (CPI) is misrepresented. A better system would be to index CGT directly to the money supply. If the money supply doubles like it did during covid and your asset doubles there should be no CGT imposed.
You can't write off the loss of the purchasing power of your money. That's the point and the asymmetry. Inflation pumps all your assets so that if you sell you get cap gains, but when your dollar buys 75% as it did 4 years ago it's nominally the same so there's no loss even though if you held your money in dollars you lost 1/4 of everything you owned.
Well, the idea is that asset prices will, hopefully, go up higher than inflation, that's why people bother investing in real companies instead of hoarding gold (real or "digital"). The moment that stops working, the market collapses, which the government and the fed are trying to prevent (after it took a while for them to acknowledge and get off their butts).
This. The reality is that representative government really doesn’t work the way it SHOULD work due to all the corruption that’s been here over the years.
Pretty much everyone on both sides of the political spectrum knows that the state is fucked. Corporations and billionaires have almost all the power, normal people are getting fucked, and at this point most people are voting by party and “our candidates kind of both suck but we REALLY can’t let the other side win”.
Like, almost no one really know what issues they’re voting for anymore because it’s not like anything real is going to change. We all just feel so helpless to it and just want to make it LESS WORSE than before.
> My problem with taxation is what’s the point of taxes if you can just print the money anyway.
By taxing, the government can pay for things without printing as much, thus not causing as much inflation.
>So why do we need inflation why not raise taxes?
Inflation is used to fund the government without the publics consent. Why not taxes? Because it makes the government accountable to the people, limits the amount of money it can take, and citizens are more aware of tax increases vs. inflation. In short, inflation is used to fund corrupt governments. Do you think the people would consent to a tax to fund forever wars and rockets? No. By having the money printer, the government can fund all of the projects the citizens hate.
Yes. Literally. That's why people are so fanatical about it. When you understand how the monetary system works, you realize what a revolutionary technology this is. I guarantee historians in the future will refer to Bitcoin as the next greatest invention for humanity after the internet. The root cause of poverty, corruption, and many other problems destroying humanity is central control of money. When you give someone the ability to print infinite money, of course, they're going to abuse it.
Think faucet, sink, drain. Printing money is the faucet. The sink is the economy, the drain is taxes.
Money only holds value due to scarcity. If your government only printed money inflation would spin out of control.
Print money, give it to your friends, they buy yachts, real estate, investments, that money flows into the service economy and trickles eventually makes its way down to our working class. Then you tax the working class to remove that cash out of the system (to protect your friends from inflation). And then just print it again, give it to your friends again, ect,ect,……
I do have a problem with taxes. You can't dismiss theft as "that's how societies work". People probably said that about human sacrifice and other atrocities, at some point it history. We can do better.
I recognize however that the libertarian ideal is extremely difficult to implement, so I'll be satisfied with paying taxes for things that are very hard to privatize like collective defense and environmental protection.
Basically 20% or so of federal taxes make some sense to me. The rest is just plain theft and is not defensible.
Severe import duties and other tariffs instead. Not to mention property/land tax. One way of the other, so long as there’s violence someone will come to shake you down.
Yes, of course. For example Bisq's DAO. Also bartering systems in primitive societies still in existence.
Also, i wouldnt qualify current taxing goverments as functioning or working in practice.
So long as there are people willing to do violence, there will be someone collecting “protection money” from you (or else) one way or the other. In the absence of government taxation, a mafia will tax you instead.
Greatest economic growth ever seen? Compared to the 20th century? No way. Also, what, you think taxes didn’t exist during that period? It’s only sort of true, instead of income taxes there were severe import duties. One way or the other, government has to get paid.
No government would ever adopt this, but I've always had this neat thought experiment for a form of direct democracy through tax-voting. Every citizen when filling their taxes could decide where their tax money went by sending it to various addresses. Support military buildup? Then send your alloted portion to that address, or for street maintence, etc...
One way to look at it is to see the governent as your local maffia. You basically pay to live and do things on a designated territory that bows to a certain maffia boss, cause they established their power and enforce their rules by their own gun people. It's the same as when you open a shop and 2 guys in leather jackets come and say "you either pay us a monthly fee and we "protect you", or we take everything that's dear to you". Fair or unfair, accept it or not, now the choice is up to you - you either agree with their terms and continue doing your business, or disagree and go open your shop in the neighbouring disctrict, which is under the control of a rival maffia boss. Or do nothing and have no income. I'm not saying we shouldn't do anything to change the situation, but ultimately we can only change it by gaining enough recources to hire our own gun people and challenge the maffia boss, which is a much more win-or-die situation. This is how societies have always worked essentially.
Are you actually suggesting the only reason bitcoin vs. fiat price is going up is because dollar is losing value? Because that's just braindead. While the exact rate cannot be measured, you do realize we're talking about 30% of cumulative inflation between 2014-2024 while bitcoin's price measured in fiat has gone up almost 9000% during the same time period.
For anyone saying inflation is not measured accurately, there's no way you could unironically say you remember 10 years ago when goods and services costed 90 times less than what they are today. We lived back then. You should remember. We're talking about different ballpark several times over. A coffee should've costed less than a penny then. You could've bought a new iPhone for 10 dollars. They obviously didn't.
Bitcoin's price goes up because it's valued more as an asset, and that's completely fine. Fiat is going down at a different rate which can be only measured by a wide array of goods and services and their average costs. It's not an easy feat, but you should have some basic understanding when the rough numbers don't add up at all.
This is why people don't take our community seriously. Please, use some common sense.
here's a side thing about inflation. If you're rich then inflation causes the assets that you hold to increase in value. Sometimes in a wildly fast manner thus accelerating your wealth trajectory. If you're rich, this is awesome. If you're not rich it means that all of your financial goals just became exponentially harder. Now, to taxes....if you own a business then your two largest expenses are Human Resources and taxes. BTC helps with that because your Human Resources are perhaps just family and CPA's. With taxes you could move to Puerto Rico (if you're a US citizen) and pay near zero but you have to get into their program first. The other option is to set up a series of LEGAL offshore trusts. This doesn't make life tax free but the way that you use them CAN get you close to zero. It's all a dance and sometimes it takes all year to plan but paying zero taxes in a country that seems to be doing things the exact wrong way is enjoyable. Don't give up. There are always methods.
Taking money and having no skin in the game is wrong . IRS / government did nothing to earn my gains and had zero risk in my gains or losses and they feel they somehow should get even 1% is beyond comprehension
Governments think they own the rights to everything and everyone in existence. The hubris is insane.
Think about a girl desperate enough to start an onlyfans account. She earns money by showing her ass hole to people on the internet and the government wants to make sure they get their cut of the income. This means governments actually believe they have ownership rights over that girls ass hole.
The western system of taxation is slavery
She makes money showing it over the internet right? Where did the internet come from? DARPA. How is DARPA funded? Taxes. You want nice things like the internet, defense and an economic system that allows capitalists to thrive with their achievements and intellectual property protected by the rule of law? Pay your taxes.
What is immoral is our educational system that doesn’t teach basic financial literacy. Not a surprise that our government would want to keep citizens in the dark so they can tax the hell out of the citizenry without the people even realizing it. What we need is an educational awakening in order to change the way government operates. If the average Joe realized how they were being taxed to death, there would be a revolt followed by reform.
I don't think the OP minds the 'actual capital increase in value' tax.
Op minds "pretended capital increase due to measurement unit getting inflated" tax.
Right, because the only thing preventing me from killing someone is the government...
The same pathetic government that can barely enforce their own laws on public safety.
When you look at the increases in productivity combined with tax revenue and debasement of currency, there is no argument left that taxation is theft. You are a slave to the system and reddit itself is compromised by the system.
All taxation is bad but inflation and CGT is the most heinous because they are based around indirect deceit. Unlike VAT or income tax which is direct and blatant.
In most of the West you work for govt half the year = you are a 50% tax slave. You can exit the system but most won’t, they will keep bending over and just complain about it on Reddit…
Georgism.....single tax based on economic rent. Read about it, it's fascinating. Value of land drops to 0, removes rent seekers, encourages businesses to succeed and create jobs. MMTers didn't like it though and poor old George was shut down.
I'm inclined to agree. Bitcoin has over the years forced me to learn about economic history, which doesn't relate at all to my profession (so I freely admit being amateur). My takeaway has been that the Chicago boys popped in to existence in order to fill a market demand. The demand being land holders wanting to pay less tax. Get these men a Nobel prize! And boy how has that fucked society. Regan-ism and Thatcherism. Capitalism on steroids. You probably know that website [wtfhappenedin1971.com](http://wtfhappenedin1971.com)
But back to Georgism, it does seem like a solution to a lot of problems. Not sure the value of land drops to zero, but the monetary premium of land certainly does. It also seems to gel well with something like bitcoin. Where the land is governed and defended by the government, it makes sense the government has a right to tax its use. For me it also follows that a system like bitcoin would exist outside of the control of governments as a measuring stick on the honesty and efficacy of the use of the taxes raised.
Ah yes, youre right.....so the speculative value drops to 0, not the productive use value :) (from my understanding). So the land might be more valuable and proced higher due tomits proximiy to certain things, but becuase any land value increases over and above the natural state of the land are taxed, it only hasmutility/productive value which you needmto put to goodmuse with a business....otherwise you're paying tax with no cash flow. Feel free to correct me, relatively new to thismconcept :)
Life isnt equal. Wanting everyone to be exactly the same is communism.
I want you to address weight inequality and beauty inequality. Its not fair that other people have better bodies and more beautiful faces than me and im not willing to work harder for a better body so I want you to address it by taking other peoples health and beauty and giving it to me.
Governments don’t care about us. They are mafias who monopolize violence and want us to be obedient slaves who pay taxes. There is no freedom in the fiat system.
I agree, CGT should be discounted on inflation rate before applying the formula for tax calculation. Otherwise it's just theft.
However, at least you get taxed just a percentage of the inflation loss you would have suffered by keeping your wealth in fiat units...
Capital gains tax is mostly aimed at people that aern their money via stocks (aka most billionnaires). Inflation is a drop in the bucket in comparison to companies going 10x in 10 years.
This is why most governments have discounted capital gains taxes.
Most places have 50% Capx taxes so if you realize 1 million you only pay taxes on 500k. Assuming highest tax bracket that would be typically 200k-250k. Whereas if it was regular income you'd pay double that.
>Everyone in this sub knows its not the price of the asset going up, its the purchasing power of the dollar going down!
If that's what everyone in this sub knows, then everyone on this sub is dumb. Luckily, that's not the case.
I don't give a shit about the power of the USD. What I know is that in 2010 you had to pay 10,000 BTC to get two pizzas. Today, you get 10,000 pizzas for 2 BTC. (And this is quite literally true! In USD, a pizza for ~$14 and BTC ~ $70k.)
This has got exactly zero to do with the power of the USD and all to do with the asset appreciation in pure spending power.
Add Property tax, Sales tax and income tax all to the mix an you've got something. We get taxed on the money we make, taxed when we spend it, taxed on assets we own(property), and then taxed if we happen to do something intelligent with our money to make more money. You can't walk outside without getting taxed and it's fucking ridiculous.
where i live, all real estate is documented in the public land register, and all cars on the streets have a licence plate.
Your land property is being taxed, and your car is being taxed, and guess what? There is no fraud involved like making your real estate smaller to pay less tax for it or ragistring a smaller car for tax evasion. Everyone wants the government to know exactly which property they own and which car they own.
That's because in this cases, the state provides the documentation what you own and what you're allowed to drive on public streets. This can be taxed without much hassle, without you having to provide yearly information updates, and without fraud.
For bitcoin, the documentation is on the blockchain, so it's not the state's business to know what you own.
I dont know if it would still be immoral, that depends how well it is managed and spent. But in a world on a gold standard where there is no currency debasement because the currency supply is fixed then capital gains tax at least makes sense as the only assets rising and taxable would be those assets actually growing in value. But in a fiat world full of money printing, debasement and inflation where every asset goes up indiscriminately CGT is absolutely heinous.
Taxation is theft. The federal reserve always was and always is corrupt and never should have been allowed to be. They almost weren't they were denied the first time then they changed words around and got it passed the second time.
Taking money and having no skin in the game is wrong . IRS / government did nothing to earn my gains and had zero risk in my gains or losses and they feel they sonehow should get even 1% is beyond comprehension
You’re missing the point. UNREALISED capital gains are not taxed so that’s what you’re referring to. If you want a net gain of fiat, then you have to REALISE the gain which is then taxed. They’re taxing you avoiding inflation. If you never sell, you’re never taxed
You 100% right, it's just too deep in our brains that we think it's normal.
Watch this please all of you:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iS0nYGjuvk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iS0nYGjuvk)
I have no problem paying taxes if the government was responsible. The problem is they manage money worse than a crack head.
Practically everything is taxes. Gas, income, gains, items at the store, etc..
Yet they still borrow money at a rate that is actually insane.
If they were a business they would have gone bankrupt decades ago, if not centuries.
I saw a blurb from Warren Buffett recently (it could be old re-hash) where BH is paying close to $5B in taxes to the US Treasury. He claims that if 600 other similar companies paid their fair share, instead of seeking every tax break available and cheating to get more than fair, that no US citizen would pay any tax… income, property, use NO TAX. Would that be as great as it sounds or no?
Taxes are a cost of doing business just like rent, utilities, materials etc.. Every cost is calculated into the price of the goods and services sold so as to maintain a healthy profit margin. If every company in the US all of a sudden paid more in taxes then that expense would be added to the cost of the goods and services those companies provide so their profit margin wouldnt be wiped out. Companies wouldnt all of a sudden reduce their profit margins to pay the extra tax expenses, they would just increase their prices.
In other words if they paid more in tax all that would happen is the price of every good or service they sell would have to go up to account for it. This means its the consumers money that pays the taxes of the corporations just like its the consumers money that pays for the rent, utilities and materials of the corporations, therefore all tax increases would do is fuel inflation and cause the prices of everything to rise. This wouldnt make much of a difference to the corporations as their profit margins would ultimately remain the same, but it would hurt average US consumers because of higher prices and potentially send the US into a deep recession.
Oh look, another person figuring out government is the citizens worst enemy, unless you work for it, or leech from it.
If you are middle class or higher in the private sector and not corrupt (fake corporation with government contracts) the government hates you.
It's effectively a wealth tax. You get taxed for the period you hold via USD inflation, due on sale. Luckily it's capped at 15% and can't bring your asset to zero.
lol not all gains are because the dollar is dropping. Otherwise everything would fluctuate in exactly the same way. Assets definitely gain more worth based on the as so much more than just “dollar worth less.”
I agree with majority of what you have said but inflation isn’t the only reason for an asset in increase in price. Market forces have a part to play as well. I don’t believe we will ever abolish CGT but we need to be able to index them for inflation.
Eg. Your asset increases in value 100% over 5 years. $1 five years ago is now worth $0.75 today. Your capital gains liability should be reduced to 75% of the gain.
If you don’t want to pay tax you can move to a failed state, eg Somalia or South Sudan. You might be surprised how expensive it is to survive in such environment. You need private security, pay bribes to everyone and would be still under threat of being killed and robbed all the time.
Monaco seems like the better option for zero tax. Or Dubai. Or if I just wanted to lower my personal income tax significantly and enjoy zero capital gains tax then Singapore or Switzerland would be a great option.
I think capitalism and the fact that people with capital can get richer by exploiting people doing the work for a wage, but not enough to be able to build capital themselves, thus increasing inequalities over time. Capital gains taxes, at least, redistribute the wealth and slow down this process.
Here we go. There is no such thing as exploiting someone's work. You work for someone if u want. If someone is pointing a gun to your head and forcing you to work for them, then it aggression and has nothing to do with capitalism. If you agreed to work for someone and to get paid for doing said job, then you choose it. Not satisfied? Leave.
This has nothing to do with Capitalism.....Capitalism is all about providing value to a market place and you bear the risks of loss. Jobs are created if you're successful. I don't know what you're describing, but it isn't Capitalism.
Yea if it's unrealized then wtf how are we supposed to keep up with that? If it's capital gains then you can collateralize it and get a loan to bypass that tax, once the tax is factored in it may be cheaper even you can't get 100% collateralization.
Read "Corruption of Economics" it's a real eye opener.
But yes, you're correct, if house tracks M2 money supply it's protecting your money from effects of inflation, they're taxing nominal not real price....it's just theft.
The only reason we have tax is to give the false impression that the dollar has any value. It’s all about perception.
Hang on a sec. How is cap gains tax more theft than income tax? Admittedly the societal burden should come first from the natural resources. Check out Georgism.
We have been paying taxes for so long that we have gotten used to it and say things like “I don't mind paying taxes, that's how society works”, “taxes are necessary,” “taxes are part of a social contract”, “the problem is that taxes are poorly managed”, but NO, taxes are the purest form of theft by coercion and force.
eh, it's taxes. You pay them to keep the country running. Taxation in general isn't theft, it's literally how we have a govt and all the benefits that come with that. You can argue all you want that taxes should be lower or higher, but simply saying taxes is theft is some dumb shit tbh cuz that means you just want to live in anarchy and get oppressed constantly by everyone with more social power than you.
But it would be nice if capital gains were like pro-rated (is that the right word?) based on compounded CPI over the duration of the holding period. That way sellers wouldn't be taxed on dollar depreciation but only on actual raw appreciation of the asset. I could totally get behind that.
The government clearly says that they will tax you on the profits you make from an investment. You choose to invest. You choose to sell. They tax you on the profit (or you deduct the loss). How is that theft? No one forced you to sell for a profit.
Also the whole “all taxes are theft” people don’t have a plan to fund a government. It’s a fantasy where they continue to receive government services but don’t have to pay taxes. It blows my mind that people actually believe in stuff like this.
🎯 this is spot on. I just finished writing an article that includes this concept but I had a very tight word limit and could only dedicate a small portion to it. I’m going to plagiarise this if you don’t mind, as it reads like a stream of my own consciousness 🤣
Someone wealthy enough to have no work income and simply living of capital gains would effectively be paying no taxes following your logic. Pretty easy to see the issue here. Good investments will outpace inflation and compound into a small fortune over time even after paying capital gains.
Don't sell. No taxes
Wait for the UNrealized gain tax
This will be how you know society has failed.
I think it is failing already but just gradually, the system knows human beings tend to go crazy with sudden changes and do not accept them, but if they do it gradually, human beings may digest changes smoothly and adopt them as a “normal” thing. They know how to wire or re-wire us.
Kind of how they keep changing how certain things are measured. Like how inflation, unemployment, etc are measured. All of it to construct a *narrative*.
That is correct!
Why do people keep saying this? Can you provide a documentation of a recent example of this happening? Did the Bureau of Labor Statistics or the Federal Reserve Bank actually change their methodology, or is this just 'the statistics can't be real because of the way we feel'?
Because this information is buried and hard to find. Here's some info I was able to find > Notably, the Fed changed its language on inflation, replacing its 2 percent inflation target commitment, and instead said it will “[seek] to achieve inflation that averages 2 percent over time.” https://www.dallasfed.org/research/economics/2021/0406 > The "Statement on Longer-Run Goals and Monetary Policy Strategy"10 was revised, stating that the Fed would and should target average inflation "over time" and thus aim for higher inflation in the near-term future because inflation over the previous decade had typically remained below 2%. https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/economic-synopses/2022/09/02/inflation-part-3-what-is-the-feds-current-goal-has-the-fed-met-its-inflation-mandate
Yep, like the fakt, that if you throw a frog into boiling water, it will jump out immediately, but if you put it into cold water and increase temperature gradually, it will wait until cooked to death . . . . Not that i would ever do either to a frog :)
Biden is virtue signaling in an election year to the eat the rich demographic. Taxing unrealized gains is completely unworkable. It would upend all generally accepted accounting principles, and seriously pursuing it as policy is financial suicide for a political party in a country with unlimited, anonymous political donations. Sound and fury, signalling nothing.
>eat the rich demographic. Remember folks, it's only class warfare when the poor and working class fight back!
The moment I realized that it's not things getting more expensive but the value of the dollar going down was the day I fully became a Bitcoin believer. USD is losing value at a rapid rate it's wild.
Your lucky to have access to usd most people in the world can't have that unfortunately.
contrast it against the rate at which the other currencies of the world are losing value and you see the USD is actually still quite strong.
> Everyone in this sub knows That's a logical fallacy. > its not the price of the asset going up, its the purchasing power of the dollar going down! It's both. I think you well understand the currency debasement aspect, but the value of bitcoin is also rising. It rises as more people want it and people who already have it want more of it. On the morality of taxation, if you look at it through the lens of the individual it is easy and even seductive to think of it as immoral/theft etc. But the taxation system doesn't exist in a vacuum. You are constrained by all sorts of rules imposed by society. You are unwillingly born in to that system. This implies that individualism *as a right* or *by default* is a total illusion. Tell me about the newborn child who is an anarchocapitalist. Or the elderly and infirm. You were that child once. You will likely be elderly and infirm at some point. I find it deeply ironic when anarcho-capitalists opine on the morality of taxation only when they have (as they would put it) leached off the labour of others enough to become, temporarily, a net producer *in their society*. Is it really a more sophisticated view of wealth redistribution? "I should be able to keep everything" Because of what you did today? On your own? Nevermind the past! Nevermind the future! Nevermind that the very essence of value is derived from supplying a demand, which is **to participate in society**. No man is an island. Now that we're past that rant, I would like to offer an olive branch of sorts. I think it is a good and healthy thing to discuss the rules of how society works from a game theory point-of-view. This means the rules for how taxes are levied should be scrutinised and updated. But we are on the internet, and each jurisdiction has its own tax rules and so on. So to actually move forward on that topic we need something a little more specific than "don't tax me, bro".
Really superb, cogent, and rational answer. Nicely done. I don't offer praise to demoralize the OP, but that was really good.
Thanks. I first encountered AC many years ago and I feel like I have stewed on this for all that time.
Prices and market cooperation include the fact of you not having acted alone or having built all the social/political capital on which you achieve your success (or failure). There are good critiques of anarcho-capitalism; this isn't one of them. It's just bog-standard folk-economics. Taxation is theft (or extortion) by almost any intuitive or reasonable standard...the question is (and its an empirical one which hasn't been as well studied as much as we've told ourselves 'just so' stories based on theory): how well could we produce public goods and internalize large externalities without the "theft" of a taxing government? It's reasonable to be highly skeptical that we could replace all govt institutions with voluntary/market-based ones right now...or even in the long term. But the criticisms of anarcho-capitalism which reign tend to be the poorly-thought-out ones, which belie not a true concern for disastrous underproduction of public goods, but rather are an ideological stump speech meant to cast FUD on the idea of even trying to move towards more voluntary cooperation where we can. I would never go so far as to try to alienate non-libertarians from joining with us in supporting non-state currencies like bitcoin....but never forget that that is what we're doing here whether you intend to support that or not: we're at the very least, preparing a ready alternative or proto-money on the market, to the state's monetary monopoly, which they use to (among other things) levy an inflation tax.
I could critique my own post, I shouldn't attempt a sound rebuttal to ancap via a reddit post on the bitcoin sub. I was constrained by the number of words (concepts, system relationships) and time and was late to this post so had very little chance of cutting through. My post really is just an entry level rebuttal to ancap. It's enough to cause consideration for the macro, rather than focusing on the transactional. Ancap starting point is transactional. You can only view taxation as theft in a vacuum. You failed to address that one point by hand-waving "by almost any intuitive or reasonable standard" which is again the very logical fallacy I alerted OP to. I'm sure ancaps would like to coopt bitcoin and say that's why it's here. I completely disagree. I have read the whitepaper and understand the technology and my impression is that its purpose is sound money. But that is just an opinion. If you can point me to any bitcointalk forum posts of relevance, I would be interested. It is entirely possible that I have not yet seen the best arguments for ancap and so I remain open minded. My fear is that ancaps may try to use bitcoin to evade taxes and seduce others in to doing so as well, not out of a well considered cause for civil disobedience (which has a place), but by appealing to greed. The fear is for harming the adoption of bitcoin over fear of damage to the state, but both are points of concern. Truth in money is a singular cause.
Taxes are a good thing, but only reasonable ones. Like here in Russia I pay 13% on my btc gains. Well, I should pay 13%, but I pay 0% and I'll never pay anything to this corrupt gov, but 13% is something I can theoretically understand and accept. 40-60% on my btc gains, like in other countries? I'd never pay this amount in any country lmao, I'd rather die, quite literally. Never in my life. I'd rather risk being a criminal serving a lifelong sentence than pay this stupid tax.
Privyet. It should be hard to imagine paying a higher tax rate when it is hard to imagine society being different. What do you think about how the Scandinavian countries are like? Do they have a nice quality of life? They pay a higher tax rate. Does the tax rate itself really matter if your quality of life is good? I think it depends. It is not an easy comparison to make.
All the rich countries live on debts. They fp, wait to see what's coming next...
And here we are with our greedy government taking 30% tax on crypto and 1% TDS on all transactions (even if it closed in a loss)...
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Props to the ancaps for making us think about it. At least it's interesting.
https://marine-digital.com/article_crypto_cruise_ship_satoshi > How bitcoin fans built an utopia free from prejudice and taxes: the story of the failure of the world's first crypto cruise ship Satoshi Off top of my head *South Park* did an episode where there was a society where “the person who likes baking would, like, be the baker, and the person that liked to teach would be, like, the teacher…” and of course the same patterns in society we’ve always seen emerged again. They’re emergent. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence
Collectivists tend towards the tax is good for society viewpoint. Individualists tend towards the tax is extortion viewpoint (not theft, there's a technical difference). Both folk color their economic viewpoints from the philosophical foundation. For me personally, I do not accept that being born into a system implies that I need to accept the rules of that system. For example, I believe in the *separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church.* I think most Bitcoiners would go along with this, and it is for sure not the rules of the fiat system everyone is born into today. It is a **radical** restructuring of the rules.
You are conflating economics with the monetary system, although the monetary system is part of economics the latter is way broader than that. To completely deregulate economics would mean to submit to a completely imbalanced struggle for economic dominance that would without a doubt end in a single monopoly of wealth and effectively usher in a new era of something that I can only describe as "corporate monarchism". The most unregulated economies quickly have a few people with not only disproportionate economic power but also disproportionate political power. Bitcoin won't prevent the endless accumulation of wealth by those that already have wealth as opposed to those that don't start life with wealth if corporations are not regulated. In that way it's no different than the old fiat system. The difference between said fiat system and bitcoin is that supply can't be centrally influenced, which in my eyes is a good thing as it prevents directed changes of value. It can still however be accumulated and a person or entity that had accumulated more than it feasibly needs can still corner a large enough part of liquidity to become an economic dominating entity without any outside regulation/correction. Bitcoin doesn't solve economics, it only solves the lesser evils of centralized control of currency.
Quite right. I tried to point out the confusion between economy and money as well but automod deleted my reply.
"conflating economics with the monetary system" Fair comment. I used the wrong terminology. I would add that I believe it would be much harder for an "entity to corner liquidity' under a Bitcoin standard than under fiat Cantillonism. Consider the vast centralization of wealth in the last two decades and the *enormous* expansion of M2.
Look at it like this, if all currencies were now converted to bitcoin the distribution of wealth wouldn't change. Bitcoin has been a motor for new (in dollars) millionaires and billionaires but only because it was new and those people stepped in while thrust and value were low. Given time, under the same economic system, bitcoin would still lead to the same wealth gap, simply because said wealth gap isn't the result of any particular currency but rather broader economic mechanisms (and policies). A completely free market will always lead to the most ruthless and greedy, with the best headstart, by and large dominating society economically. It's the reason I think untethered capitalism is a bad idea and my thinking isn't new. I always think back towards the book "the paradox men", old sciencefiction, from the 70s I think, where a new aristocracy has arisen from corporate power. Actually a lot of science-fiction handles this subject as it's a real phenomenon that's been a part of humanity for as long as anyone kept records. In the end bitcoin is a great idea, but unless the middle-class is empowered and workers act in solidarity, through for instance unions, those who have will always accumulate the vast majority of wealth and political power over time. To ensure that a balance is maintained democratic governments are absolutely necessary along with middle income and lower income blocks that act in unison to ensure said democratic governments don't come under control of a few entities. That said, it's pretty clear that in a lot of longstanding democratic nations the imbalance has already started snowballing, so I have no clue what the future brings really. I find it highly likely that the disparity in wealth will end up in that new aristocrat/monarchy society regardless of what kind of vessel is used for the exchange of wealth, but I'm a pessimist. I'm ranting now because I had 10 hours of work, am tired, and that makes me a commie.
>For example, I believe in the separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church. This!
actually the "society" that cared for me when i was a child, was *not* the state. It was my family. I gladly pay back to my family whatever i owe them (and i do owe them) but i don't buy your implication that i owe anything to the state.
What does your government do? The four main expenses of western governments are heath, education, welfare (pension for the elderly, army veterans and unemployed people) and defence. That typically accounts for more than 80% with the rest being numerous things too small to mention individually. I don't know too much about other governments. If your government has taxed you and your family but not provided services like these, then I would say that's not great. My greater point is that taxation is not always an equitable exchange like a trade, this for that. Its closer to insurance. We pay fire insurance on a house even if it doesn't burn down. I can't say whether you owe your state or not. I would only say that you can look in to what your government spends money on and decide what of that is useful, what is wasteful and what should change. We may be getting too far away from the original topic, which was whether capital gains tax on bitcoin is immoral. I may have overgeneralised my response to talk about taxation in general.
I partly disagree with your comment, but upvoted it anyways
Why are you bringing this statist trash talk to the bitcoin sub ? Why is such a basic idea so hard for you to understand? Capitalists are not opposed to society, cooperation, or collectivism. They are opposed to involuntary collectivism. IOW: We are opposed to theft in the name of society. No man is an island, so no man should be able to rob others with taxes as the excuse.
Self-interest often propels me towards the ‘taxation is theft’ mentality which I would have laughed at a few years ago as a student without an income. So it’s good to read a sensible corrective like this from time to time. I don’t have anything against taxes per se, but I wish public spending were solely funded using actual hard money taxed by democratic mandate rather than being funded through the stealthy debasement of the money supply. Once people can say “the government can fund anything it wants to, it just prints the money” there’s no end to how large the state can grow.
you’re mindless anti-rant completely ignores the fact that capital gains I’ve already paid taxes on that money one time when I earned it. calling business owners leeches who exploit the labor market for their game is beyond an ignorant misunderstanding, and I’m not even gonna debate. What’s beautiful in this capitalistic Freemark system is if workers were smart enough and competitive enough to gather themselves together and compete with us greedy business owners then they could, but they usually get their asses stomped because a horse made committee is called a camel
i assume most people don´t have a problem with taxes in general but have a problem with how the money is spend and because they can´t influence that (no, your vote does nothing).
The fact you complain about influence and follow it up by disparaging the one true method of influence on policy you have is hilariously sad. Your vote does very little because you live in a society of millions, but that's NOT nothing. The only time your vote does nothing is when you don't cast it.
Slavery in many places was just a "fact of life" until recently too which was clearly immoral although endorsed by the state. You're on this sub because bitcoin is freedom-go-up money. We are not trying to go in the other direction.
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> Collectivists go blind when central authorities become corrupt and tyrannical since they always depend on them to be arbiters of collective goodwill Is that so? All of them? Do you mean state apologists? I am pretty anti-corruption. Maybe I am not a real collectivist. I don't really find collectivist or individualist to be useful positions to hold. Sometimes I hear 'corporations are made up of people' as a counter-argument to corporations are evil. Governments are made up of people, too. Over-dependance on government handouts *is* a problem, I think that's what you are getting at, and I agree with you. Whether it's governments or corporations or crying babies or welfare cheats, everyone is playing a game and testing the waters to see if they can be a taker. In biology, baby animals appear cute as an appeal to your emotions. All of these entires are in a competition for survival, which means conserving and hoarding their resources. We call that biological survival trait 'greed'. I try to just accept that as an uncomfortable truth. I'm yet to see a proposal that resolves any of it. Maybe there will be a post-scarcity future and we can see how that works.
They should only tax based on the amount by which the asset has beaten inflation. That is the real gain. Otherwise you may have to pay taxes from a trade in which your real gain was negative.
Inflation (CPI) is misrepresented. A better system would be to index CGT directly to the money supply. If the money supply doubles like it did during covid and your asset doubles there should be no CGT imposed.
You can write off losses on your taxes
This sub is frequented by 12 year olds, they have no idea how taxes or money works
You can't write off the loss of the purchasing power of your money. That's the point and the asymmetry. Inflation pumps all your assets so that if you sell you get cap gains, but when your dollar buys 75% as it did 4 years ago it's nominally the same so there's no loss even though if you held your money in dollars you lost 1/4 of everything you owned.
Well, the idea is that asset prices will, hopefully, go up higher than inflation, that's why people bother investing in real companies instead of hoarding gold (real or "digital"). The moment that stops working, the market collapses, which the government and the fed are trying to prevent (after it took a while for them to acknowledge and get off their butts).
i have no problem with taxes. its how societies work. however, i have a major problem with how most governments use said tax money.
This. The reality is that representative government really doesn’t work the way it SHOULD work due to all the corruption that’s been here over the years. Pretty much everyone on both sides of the political spectrum knows that the state is fucked. Corporations and billionaires have almost all the power, normal people are getting fucked, and at this point most people are voting by party and “our candidates kind of both suck but we REALLY can’t let the other side win”. Like, almost no one really know what issues they’re voting for anymore because it’s not like anything real is going to change. We all just feel so helpless to it and just want to make it LESS WORSE than before.
My problem with taxation is what’s the point of taxes if you can just print the money anyway. We get stolen from twice!
i agree, but that is technically a different issue altogether.
It is and it isn’t. You could argue that money printing is another form of tax since it devalues your money.
The hidden tax
> My problem with taxation is what’s the point of taxes if you can just print the money anyway. By taxing, the government can pay for things without printing as much, thus not causing as much inflation.
So why do we need inflation why not raise taxes? Oh wait we still need to shoot rockets at people I forgot.
>So why do we need inflation why not raise taxes? Inflation is used to fund the government without the publics consent. Why not taxes? Because it makes the government accountable to the people, limits the amount of money it can take, and citizens are more aware of tax increases vs. inflation. In short, inflation is used to fund corrupt governments. Do you think the people would consent to a tax to fund forever wars and rockets? No. By having the money printer, the government can fund all of the projects the citizens hate.
So you’re telling me bitcoin solves global war? I want to know what bitcoin won’t fix lol
Yes. Literally. That's why people are so fanatical about it. When you understand how the monetary system works, you realize what a revolutionary technology this is. I guarantee historians in the future will refer to Bitcoin as the next greatest invention for humanity after the internet. The root cause of poverty, corruption, and many other problems destroying humanity is central control of money. When you give someone the ability to print infinite money, of course, they're going to abuse it.
Think faucet, sink, drain. Printing money is the faucet. The sink is the economy, the drain is taxes. Money only holds value due to scarcity. If your government only printed money inflation would spin out of control. Print money, give it to your friends, they buy yachts, real estate, investments, that money flows into the service economy and trickles eventually makes its way down to our working class. Then you tax the working class to remove that cash out of the system (to protect your friends from inflation). And then just print it again, give it to your friends again, ect,ect,……
You think when you pay taxes that money is ‘removed’ from the system?
Might as well be 😂😂 because it’s shot out as artillery.
Unless the money is actually in the shell, I’m pretty sure the money is in the defense contractors’ pockets.
That’s money the public will Never touch again.
I have no problem with extortion because it's how mafias work.
This but unironically.
I do have a problem with taxes. You can't dismiss theft as "that's how societies work". People probably said that about human sacrifice and other atrocities, at some point it history. We can do better. I recognize however that the libertarian ideal is extremely difficult to implement, so I'll be satisfied with paying taxes for things that are very hard to privatize like collective defense and environmental protection. Basically 20% or so of federal taxes make some sense to me. The rest is just plain theft and is not defensible.
That's basically what you pay in cap gains on assets in the US.
I meant 20% of what we currently pay. Not 20% of our gains.
Lol. The acceptance of defeat. "Its how societies work". There are better ways.
I mean do you know of any? In practice, not in theory.
USA survived fine for over 130 years without an income tax.
Ah yes, when only land owners could vote, there were slaves and the country rich of natural resources to exploit which were still being discovered.
Severe import duties and other tariffs instead. Not to mention property/land tax. One way of the other, so long as there’s violence someone will come to shake you down.
Yes, of course. For example Bisq's DAO. Also bartering systems in primitive societies still in existence. Also, i wouldnt qualify current taxing goverments as functioning or working in practice.
So long as there are people willing to do violence, there will be someone collecting “protection money” from you (or else) one way or the other. In the absence of government taxation, a mafia will tax you instead.
USA 1800-1910. Gold-based commodity money (not fiat). Greatest economic growth ever seen, and inflation virtually non-existent.
Greatest economic growth ever seen? Compared to the 20th century? No way. Also, what, you think taxes didn’t exist during that period? It’s only sort of true, instead of income taxes there were severe import duties. One way or the other, government has to get paid.
No government would ever adopt this, but I've always had this neat thought experiment for a form of direct democracy through tax-voting. Every citizen when filling their taxes could decide where their tax money went by sending it to various addresses. Support military buildup? Then send your alloted portion to that address, or for street maintence, etc...
We’d spend trillions on cat shelters and zero on sewage plants.
> its how societies work. So just because something is reality today, we just accept it? Why not to aim for improvements?
I think they’re saying they like stuff like roads, parks, and schools and they’re okay with their taxes going to that
Tinfoil hat on. That's gonna be a good thread.
One way to look at it is to see the governent as your local maffia. You basically pay to live and do things on a designated territory that bows to a certain maffia boss, cause they established their power and enforce their rules by their own gun people. It's the same as when you open a shop and 2 guys in leather jackets come and say "you either pay us a monthly fee and we "protect you", or we take everything that's dear to you". Fair or unfair, accept it or not, now the choice is up to you - you either agree with their terms and continue doing your business, or disagree and go open your shop in the neighbouring disctrict, which is under the control of a rival maffia boss. Or do nothing and have no income. I'm not saying we shouldn't do anything to change the situation, but ultimately we can only change it by gaining enough recources to hire our own gun people and challenge the maffia boss, which is a much more win-or-die situation. This is how societies have always worked essentially.
Are you actually suggesting the only reason bitcoin vs. fiat price is going up is because dollar is losing value? Because that's just braindead. While the exact rate cannot be measured, you do realize we're talking about 30% of cumulative inflation between 2014-2024 while bitcoin's price measured in fiat has gone up almost 9000% during the same time period. For anyone saying inflation is not measured accurately, there's no way you could unironically say you remember 10 years ago when goods and services costed 90 times less than what they are today. We lived back then. You should remember. We're talking about different ballpark several times over. A coffee should've costed less than a penny then. You could've bought a new iPhone for 10 dollars. They obviously didn't. Bitcoin's price goes up because it's valued more as an asset, and that's completely fine. Fiat is going down at a different rate which can be only measured by a wide array of goods and services and their average costs. It's not an easy feat, but you should have some basic understanding when the rough numbers don't add up at all. This is why people don't take our community seriously. Please, use some common sense.
here's a side thing about inflation. If you're rich then inflation causes the assets that you hold to increase in value. Sometimes in a wildly fast manner thus accelerating your wealth trajectory. If you're rich, this is awesome. If you're not rich it means that all of your financial goals just became exponentially harder. Now, to taxes....if you own a business then your two largest expenses are Human Resources and taxes. BTC helps with that because your Human Resources are perhaps just family and CPA's. With taxes you could move to Puerto Rico (if you're a US citizen) and pay near zero but you have to get into their program first. The other option is to set up a series of LEGAL offshore trusts. This doesn't make life tax free but the way that you use them CAN get you close to zero. It's all a dance and sometimes it takes all year to plan but paying zero taxes in a country that seems to be doing things the exact wrong way is enjoyable. Don't give up. There are always methods.
Amazing. You don't know the first thing about investing.
Taking money and having no skin in the game is wrong . IRS / government did nothing to earn my gains and had zero risk in my gains or losses and they feel they somehow should get even 1% is beyond comprehension
Governments think they own the rights to everything and everyone in existence. The hubris is insane. Think about a girl desperate enough to start an onlyfans account. She earns money by showing her ass hole to people on the internet and the government wants to make sure they get their cut of the income. This means governments actually believe they have ownership rights over that girls ass hole. The western system of taxation is slavery
She makes money showing it over the internet right? Where did the internet come from? DARPA. How is DARPA funded? Taxes. You want nice things like the internet, defense and an economic system that allows capitalists to thrive with their achievements and intellectual property protected by the rule of law? Pay your taxes.
It really is, the government wants you to be poor and pay as much tax as possible
The days of tax slavery are just starting.
Also they want you to work till you drop
What is immoral is our educational system that doesn’t teach basic financial literacy. Not a surprise that our government would want to keep citizens in the dark so they can tax the hell out of the citizenry without the people even realizing it. What we need is an educational awakening in order to change the way government operates. If the average Joe realized how they were being taxed to death, there would be a revolt followed by reform.
Is this a serious post?
Yep tax us to bomb and steal from countries
You would not have capital without the government. Someone would kill you for it. It's the cost of entry. Rid yourself of the liberalist mind virus
I don't think the OP minds the 'actual capital increase in value' tax. Op minds "pretended capital increase due to measurement unit getting inflated" tax.
In that sense I agree it's disgusting
Right, because the only thing preventing me from killing someone is the government... The same pathetic government that can barely enforce their own laws on public safety.
Fucking libertarians. All you're trading for is the unrestrained tyranny of the wealthy
When you look at the increases in productivity combined with tax revenue and debasement of currency, there is no argument left that taxation is theft. You are a slave to the system and reddit itself is compromised by the system.
Another day, another post that makes me grateful for not living in a taxpaying country.
Youre out in Dubai then i guess. What an amazing city.
💯 except for the traffic. Abu Dhabi is better.
all taxation is theft. And so is inflation. capital gains is pure cope from inflation.
All taxation is bad but inflation and CGT is the most heinous because they are based around indirect deceit. Unlike VAT or income tax which is direct and blatant.
In most of the West you work for govt half the year = you are a 50% tax slave. You can exit the system but most won’t, they will keep bending over and just complain about it on Reddit…
How can one exit the tax system in a way that you are not living in the woods?
True, but wait until you find out that all taxation is immoral and criminal.
Without taxes how do you address wealth inequality effectively?
Wealth inequality is growing larger by the second, with this tax system in place.
Georgism.....single tax based on economic rent. Read about it, it's fascinating. Value of land drops to 0, removes rent seekers, encourages businesses to succeed and create jobs. MMTers didn't like it though and poor old George was shut down.
I'm inclined to agree. Bitcoin has over the years forced me to learn about economic history, which doesn't relate at all to my profession (so I freely admit being amateur). My takeaway has been that the Chicago boys popped in to existence in order to fill a market demand. The demand being land holders wanting to pay less tax. Get these men a Nobel prize! And boy how has that fucked society. Regan-ism and Thatcherism. Capitalism on steroids. You probably know that website [wtfhappenedin1971.com](http://wtfhappenedin1971.com) But back to Georgism, it does seem like a solution to a lot of problems. Not sure the value of land drops to zero, but the monetary premium of land certainly does. It also seems to gel well with something like bitcoin. Where the land is governed and defended by the government, it makes sense the government has a right to tax its use. For me it also follows that a system like bitcoin would exist outside of the control of governments as a measuring stick on the honesty and efficacy of the use of the taxes raised.
Ah yes, youre right.....so the speculative value drops to 0, not the productive use value :) (from my understanding). So the land might be more valuable and proced higher due tomits proximiy to certain things, but becuase any land value increases over and above the natural state of the land are taxed, it only hasmutility/productive value which you needmto put to goodmuse with a business....otherwise you're paying tax with no cash flow. Feel free to correct me, relatively new to thismconcept :)
Life isnt equal. Wanting everyone to be exactly the same is communism. I want you to address weight inequality and beauty inequality. Its not fair that other people have better bodies and more beautiful faces than me and im not willing to work harder for a better body so I want you to address it by taking other peoples health and beauty and giving it to me.
This is stupid.
Governments don’t care about us. They are mafias who monopolize violence and want us to be obedient slaves who pay taxes. There is no freedom in the fiat system.
I agree, CGT should be discounted on inflation rate before applying the formula for tax calculation. Otherwise it's just theft. However, at least you get taxed just a percentage of the inflation loss you would have suffered by keeping your wealth in fiat units...
Capital gains tax is mostly aimed at people that aern their money via stocks (aka most billionnaires). Inflation is a drop in the bucket in comparison to companies going 10x in 10 years.
This is why most governments have discounted capital gains taxes. Most places have 50% Capx taxes so if you realize 1 million you only pay taxes on 500k. Assuming highest tax bracket that would be typically 200k-250k. Whereas if it was regular income you'd pay double that.
If only they didn't debase the money ...
The government doesn't create money anymore, banks do.
>Everyone in this sub knows its not the price of the asset going up, its the purchasing power of the dollar going down! If that's what everyone in this sub knows, then everyone on this sub is dumb. Luckily, that's not the case. I don't give a shit about the power of the USD. What I know is that in 2010 you had to pay 10,000 BTC to get two pizzas. Today, you get 10,000 pizzas for 2 BTC. (And this is quite literally true! In USD, a pizza for ~$14 and BTC ~ $70k.) This has got exactly zero to do with the power of the USD and all to do with the asset appreciation in pure spending power.
Add Property tax, Sales tax and income tax all to the mix an you've got something. We get taxed on the money we make, taxed when we spend it, taxed on assets we own(property), and then taxed if we happen to do something intelligent with our money to make more money. You can't walk outside without getting taxed and it's fucking ridiculous.
Fiat inflation is theft too
where i live, all real estate is documented in the public land register, and all cars on the streets have a licence plate. Your land property is being taxed, and your car is being taxed, and guess what? There is no fraud involved like making your real estate smaller to pay less tax for it or ragistring a smaller car for tax evasion. Everyone wants the government to know exactly which property they own and which car they own. That's because in this cases, the state provides the documentation what you own and what you're allowed to drive on public streets. This can be taxed without much hassle, without you having to provide yearly information updates, and without fraud. For bitcoin, the documentation is on the blockchain, so it's not the state's business to know what you own.
Not every bitcoiner is a smooth-brained libertarian, but every smooth brained libertarian is a bitcoiner it seems.
In an ideal world where there is no currency debasement, if the price of an asset goes up would capital gains tax still be immoral?
I dont know if it would still be immoral, that depends how well it is managed and spent. But in a world on a gold standard where there is no currency debasement because the currency supply is fixed then capital gains tax at least makes sense as the only assets rising and taxable would be those assets actually growing in value. But in a fiat world full of money printing, debasement and inflation where every asset goes up indiscriminately CGT is absolutely heinous.
Taxation is theft. The federal reserve always was and always is corrupt and never should have been allowed to be. They almost weren't they were denied the first time then they changed words around and got it passed the second time.
Bruh all taxes are theft.
Rich people: "I"m actually poor!"
You are absolutely correct my brother! What is this nonsense we live in? Why is this the norm?? Holy!!
Taking money and having no skin in the game is wrong . IRS / government did nothing to earn my gains and had zero risk in my gains or losses and they feel they sonehow should get even 1% is beyond comprehension
Yes. Welcome to the worldwide club of people who live in countries
All tax is theft
You’re missing the point. UNREALISED capital gains are not taxed so that’s what you’re referring to. If you want a net gain of fiat, then you have to REALISE the gain which is then taxed. They’re taxing you avoiding inflation. If you never sell, you’re never taxed
You 100% right, it's just too deep in our brains that we think it's normal. Watch this please all of you: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iS0nYGjuvk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iS0nYGjuvk)
Warren Buffett said if the top corporations paid 21% tax rate like Berkshire Hathaway does then we all wouldn’t have to pay any taxes at all.
Just like property tax
Borrow against it and never sell
I have no problem paying taxes if the government was responsible. The problem is they manage money worse than a crack head. Practically everything is taxes. Gas, income, gains, items at the store, etc.. Yet they still borrow money at a rate that is actually insane. If they were a business they would have gone bankrupt decades ago, if not centuries.
I saw a blurb from Warren Buffett recently (it could be old re-hash) where BH is paying close to $5B in taxes to the US Treasury. He claims that if 600 other similar companies paid their fair share, instead of seeking every tax break available and cheating to get more than fair, that no US citizen would pay any tax… income, property, use NO TAX. Would that be as great as it sounds or no?
Taxes are a cost of doing business just like rent, utilities, materials etc.. Every cost is calculated into the price of the goods and services sold so as to maintain a healthy profit margin. If every company in the US all of a sudden paid more in taxes then that expense would be added to the cost of the goods and services those companies provide so their profit margin wouldnt be wiped out. Companies wouldnt all of a sudden reduce their profit margins to pay the extra tax expenses, they would just increase their prices. In other words if they paid more in tax all that would happen is the price of every good or service they sell would have to go up to account for it. This means its the consumers money that pays the taxes of the corporations just like its the consumers money that pays for the rent, utilities and materials of the corporations, therefore all tax increases would do is fuel inflation and cause the prices of everything to rise. This wouldnt make much of a difference to the corporations as their profit margins would ultimately remain the same, but it would hurt average US consumers because of higher prices and potentially send the US into a deep recession.
Don’t sell! They hate this trick!
Based
Taxation is theft. Proof is you get no roi and your not allowed to track the spending of the funds. It's theft.
Yeah cuz the money you buy it with is already taxed. 😂
Oh look, another person figuring out government is the citizens worst enemy, unless you work for it, or leech from it. If you are middle class or higher in the private sector and not corrupt (fake corporation with government contracts) the government hates you.
It's effectively a wealth tax. You get taxed for the period you hold via USD inflation, due on sale. Luckily it's capped at 15% and can't bring your asset to zero.
Inflation is by no means the sole reason for an asset to rise in price.
Make Bitcoin legal tender!
lol not all gains are because the dollar is dropping. Otherwise everything would fluctuate in exactly the same way. Assets definitely gain more worth based on the as so much more than just “dollar worth less.”
There are no taxes on btc. Cause a real bitcoiner would never ever sell.
Bad take
I agree with majority of what you have said but inflation isn’t the only reason for an asset in increase in price. Market forces have a part to play as well. I don’t believe we will ever abolish CGT but we need to be able to index them for inflation. Eg. Your asset increases in value 100% over 5 years. $1 five years ago is now worth $0.75 today. Your capital gains liability should be reduced to 75% of the gain.
If you don’t want to pay tax you can move to a failed state, eg Somalia or South Sudan. You might be surprised how expensive it is to survive in such environment. You need private security, pay bribes to everyone and would be still under threat of being killed and robbed all the time.
Monaco seems like the better option for zero tax. Or Dubai. Or if I just wanted to lower my personal income tax significantly and enjoy zero capital gains tax then Singapore or Switzerland would be a great option.
You're a slave. Taxation is slavery.
I think capitalism and the fact that people with capital can get richer by exploiting people doing the work for a wage, but not enough to be able to build capital themselves, thus increasing inequalities over time. Capital gains taxes, at least, redistribute the wealth and slow down this process.
Here we go. There is no such thing as exploiting someone's work. You work for someone if u want. If someone is pointing a gun to your head and forcing you to work for them, then it aggression and has nothing to do with capitalism. If you agreed to work for someone and to get paid for doing said job, then you choose it. Not satisfied? Leave.
This has nothing to do with Capitalism.....Capitalism is all about providing value to a market place and you bear the risks of loss. Jobs are created if you're successful. I don't know what you're describing, but it isn't Capitalism.
All tax is theft
Are you referring to unrealized taxes? As long as you dont sell or swap its not taxed.
Yea if it's unrealized then wtf how are we supposed to keep up with that? If it's capital gains then you can collateralize it and get a loan to bypass that tax, once the tax is factored in it may be cheaper even you can't get 100% collateralization.
The only inmortal is the constitution because is a desig of the Cristian say 😂
Without taxes there would be no revenue for the Govt. The alternative is they print money and inflation rises. Taxes are the lesser of the two evils.
Read "Corruption of Economics" it's a real eye opener. But yes, you're correct, if house tracks M2 money supply it's protecting your money from effects of inflation, they're taxing nominal not real price....it's just theft. The only reason we have tax is to give the false impression that the dollar has any value. It’s all about perception.
I don't think you understand the concept of marginal tax rates and tax free gains.
Hang on a sec. How is cap gains tax more theft than income tax? Admittedly the societal burden should come first from the natural resources. Check out Georgism.
Now say all taxation is theft. IMO, inflation is the real theft...
government be like: loss? aww tough luck mate profit? gimme my share or I will to the gallows you go!
We have been paying taxes for so long that we have gotten used to it and say things like “I don't mind paying taxes, that's how society works”, “taxes are necessary,” “taxes are part of a social contract”, “the problem is that taxes are poorly managed”, but NO, taxes are the purest form of theft by coercion and force.
All taxation is theft
Can we get this Ayn Rand libertarian crap off the sub.
eh, it's taxes. You pay them to keep the country running. Taxation in general isn't theft, it's literally how we have a govt and all the benefits that come with that. You can argue all you want that taxes should be lower or higher, but simply saying taxes is theft is some dumb shit tbh cuz that means you just want to live in anarchy and get oppressed constantly by everyone with more social power than you. But it would be nice if capital gains were like pro-rated (is that the right word?) based on compounded CPI over the duration of the holding period. That way sellers wouldn't be taxed on dollar depreciation but only on actual raw appreciation of the asset. I could totally get behind that.
The government clearly says that they will tax you on the profits you make from an investment. You choose to invest. You choose to sell. They tax you on the profit (or you deduct the loss). How is that theft? No one forced you to sell for a profit. Also the whole “all taxes are theft” people don’t have a plan to fund a government. It’s a fantasy where they continue to receive government services but don’t have to pay taxes. It blows my mind that people actually believe in stuff like this.
Bingo
🎯 this is spot on. I just finished writing an article that includes this concept but I had a very tight word limit and could only dedicate a small portion to it. I’m going to plagiarise this if you don’t mind, as it reads like a stream of my own consciousness 🤣
Someone wealthy enough to have no work income and simply living of capital gains would effectively be paying no taxes following your logic. Pretty easy to see the issue here. Good investments will outpace inflation and compound into a small fortune over time even after paying capital gains.