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http://www.gnu.org/software/taler/
Thank you. This actually surprised me.
GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society
61–70 of 188 posts
Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society
#62No thank you. With regards to my government, I would like to see more privacy rather than less. This seems to give me less. I do like the idea of complete transactional privacy between end users and/or merchants. But we already have this today with CryptoNote based cryptocurrencies like Monero - with optional transparency through "view keys".
> When you pay with Taler, your identity does not have to be revealed to the merchant. The bank, government and mint will also never learn how you spent your electronic money. However, you can prove that you paid in court if necessary.
Again, existing technologies already provide this. And they further empower the user to expressly define how much anonymity they want...down to the transactional level.
Empowering governments with additional taxation tools is about the only thing this brings to the table over existing technologies.
Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
We never had roads before the 19th century when personal income tax was introduced.
Regardless of the type of tax, roads have been built by governments using tax revenue since history began. [1] Is your grievance with personal income tax in particular or taxes in general? Because for taxes to work at all, there needs to be some way for governments to have some visibility on the flow of cash in the economy, right? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road#History
Yes, my comment was sarcastic. Roads have been and still are built by governments and private groups and even individuals for a long time. I have no issues with taxation in general, but I think personal income tax is a mistake and related to other mistakes whose trend started around the French Revolution such as the movement from private to public government and consequently a never-ending cycle of the public trying to vote parts of itself maximal shares of the treasury without destroying the whole thing.
Any entity worthy of the name government has a very simple way of visualizing the flow of cash in the economy: door to door searches. If the organized manpower for this does not exist, the government will have a hard time collecting taxes no matter how many technological shortcuts to the physical searching (like, say, property records on stone tablets) they use.
Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society
#64Taxable & anonymous at the same time? The marketing of this sounds shady. I don't know if the "inventors" or whatever really know what they are doing...
It's in development at a university that's known for its computer science research and work: http://www.inria.fr/
For example, Facebook has partnered with the university and it's also the birthplace of the OCAML language. They have some sharp people doing research work there, if this was a VC-backed company or a kickstarter, I would be much more skeptical and think it's shady. However, the bar at a university is much higher so we'll see what they do deliver and how it works whenever they deliver it in the next year.
Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because unless the government can track citizen's income it cannot tax it, and without taxes modern society cannot function at all. Technologies like this would be a boon to many developing countries like mine where tax evasion and corruption is rampant. It would enable the government to collect funds for infrastructure, education, environmental protection and healthcare (and yes, I am a progressive liberal who would…
> Because unless the government can track citizen's income it cannot tax it. That's simply not true. When I do my taxes I have to report my yearly income. The kind of system where a government can monitor all of my transactions in real time is without any court involvement is insane. You might as well use your bank card as at least those require a warrant or subpoena to acquire.
The text of the announcement seems to imply that individual transactions are not identifiable. The tax is taken per-transaction by the bank on behalf of the government or regulating entity without knowledge of the participants.
> When you pay with Taler, your identity does not have to be revealed to the merchant. The bank, government and mint will also never learn how you spent your electronic money.
Or something. The details aren't there yet.
Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society
#66I have this strange idea that once the government-agents really understand what e-payments, even block-chain-powered e-currencies bring to the table, in terms of money control, they'll embrace it. It's a no-brainer. That said, taxes are not inherently bad. Governments on the other hand... Have an awfully bad track-record of power abuse.
"Governments on the other hand... Have an awfully bad track-record of power abuse"
Well ... yes, but isn't that just an unnecessarily specific version of the true statement "Humans have an awfully bad track record of power abuse"?
Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
I will take nonsense like this seriously when its proponents no longer avail themselves of the benefits of assets created through taxation. Which would be never.
If I steal your car and leave you a bike, are you an hypocrite if you use the bike while condemning theft? I am not saying taxes are theft, but if one does believe so, I don't think it's hypocrisy to try to at least get some of it back.
Weird analogy. But if you want it to be more accurate:
If the government takes your bike and gives it to me after taking my car, I'd be hypocritical to condemn theft and retain your bike. I have no claim to your property under my anti-theft ethics, therefore I should return it to you.
Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society
#68I have this strange idea that once the government-agents really understand what e-payments, even block-chain-powered e-currencies bring to the table, in terms of money control, they'll embrace it. It's a no-brainer. That said, taxes are not inherently bad. Governments on the other hand... Have an awfully bad track-record of power abuse.
"Governments on the other hand... Have an awfully bad track-record of power abuse" Well ... yes, but isn't that just an unnecessarily specific version of the true statement "Humans have an awfully bad track record of power abuse"?
That's the big question in a nutshell: Are some humans just bad? Or does power make any human bad?
Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society
#69> Unlike BitCoin or cash payments, Taler ensures that governments can easily track their citizen's income and thus collect sales, value-added or income taxes. Taler is thus a currency for the mainstream economy, and not the black market.
This simultaneously implies that both Bitcoin and cash are not suitable for the mainstream economy. I think the opinion that cash should be given up would be fairly controversial, even today. Furthermore, a law abiding citizen will still pay taxes on their Bitcoin income - the same way they would for cash. Just because Bitcoin makes it harder to prove tax evasion doesn't mean we should eschew Bitcoin and cash. The technology exists regardless, governments will have to adapt.
> When you pay with Taler, your identity does not have to be revealed to the merchant. The bank, government and mint will also never learn how you spent your electronic money. However, you can prove that you paid in court if necessary.
This feature is offering nothing not already available, although it seems to imply that one could not prove payment with Bitcoin, which is false, as it is trivial.
Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
Regardless of the type of tax, roads have been built by governments using tax revenue since history began. [1] Is your grievance with personal income tax in particular or taxes in general? Because for taxes to work at all, there needs to be some way for governments to have some visibility on the flow of cash in the economy, right? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road#History
Thieves seem to manage without having a detailed list of assets, I'm sure government can too.
Thieves don't scale.