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The Massachusetts Software Tax

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Re: The Massachusetts Software Tax

#151

Post by thecodeore »

jrockway wrote: post #146
thecodeore wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not believe, support, or accept "democracy" or mob rule. I do not believe the "majority" has the moral right to lay claim to my labor or the product there of, nor tell me how to live my life. I believe in Non-Aggression Principle and the voluntary exchange of goods and services You are correct in I do not exist in an island, however I do VOLUNTARILY exchange my labor for goods and services, this is society, not…

I see today was your 15th birthday and your parents finally let you onto the Internet. Congratulations. That said, there are a number of externalities that you're not thinking of. The simplest is: without a government, what's to stop someone from walking into your house and killing you? Every incentive says they should: free money, no consequences. Another is: if we privatize everything, then only the wealthy get the…

Why is that the every statist I encounter always believe those that want to live a life free of coercion and institutionalized violence must be a teen?

I am more than likely your Senior, it is infact youth that believes that government is required for a functional society, that government some how makes society better with age comes the wisdom to understand the true evil of government

>That said, there are a number of externalities that you're not thinking of. The simplest is: without a government, what's to stop someone from walking into your house and killing you? Every incentive says they should: free money, no consequences.

Watch this...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbNFJK1ZpVg

Re: The Massachusetts Software Tax

#152

Post by ars »

crazygringo wrote: post #58

I can't find the link to the previous HN thread about this (and Google isn't helping), but someone had posted that the whole point of this tax was to essentially close a loophole where normal software sales are taxed, but a consulting firm who makes a tiny tweak and sells the software under "consulting services" because they "install a solution" for the client, doesn't charge sales tax. So if that's accurate, it make…

> but a consulting firm who makes a tiny tweak and sells the software under "consulting services" because they "install a solution" for the client, doesn't charge sales tax.

Then the consulting firm would pay the sales tax when they buy the software (before tweaking it).

Re: The Massachusetts Software Tax

#153

Post by pmorici »

rwl wrote: post #96
thecodeore wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would prefer to pay for services I use then to have the money stolen from me by force while people pretend it is moral because it is called "taxes"

OK, you're trolling here, and if I could downvote you for it, I would; but since I can't, let me try to raise the level of discussion: > I would prefer to pay for services I use I invite you, sometime, to think about which services you really use, and try to figure out how much it would cost to purchase each of them if you were doing so on your own. Don't forget: police protection, fire protection, military protectio…

"police protection"

I've had the misfortune of having to deal with the police of two different police departments this year. In the first instance my car was stolen, in the second someone ran into my car that was parked on the side of the road. In both instances the Police were totally incompetent and arguably caused me more financial damage than the criminal and the out of control driver.

Here is how; Once the Police "recovered" my stolen car I had to pay their towing company of choice about $400 to get my car back. In the second case they have taken over a month to issue the police report about the accident; my insurance company won't pay to have the car fixed until they have the report so I've had to front the costs in the mean time and hope that they get their act together at some point.

I think I would have been better off in both situations if there had been no police and my taxes were a bit lower.

Re: The Massachusetts Software Tax

#154

Post by smsm42 »

cinquemb wrote: post #130
smsm42 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These data are probably available buries somewhere in periodic financial reports that many cities publish, but as far as I know, there's no common format, many of these reports are not well readable by tools (best case - nicely formatted PDF with numbers buried somewhere within, worst case - PDF scan of some typed pages with numbers buried within) and as far as I know no site that actually aggregates these data into…

I think you are spot on. I've been searching, and mostly coming up with PDF's (that do give the overall numbers) with very little break down for cities. It's a pity that with all the hand waving over Open Gov initiatives that things like this are still buried, while I can easily find out all the different colors of street lamps implemented for the past 10 years for xyz neighborhoods…

Feds probably could use the power of federal grants (or withdrawal of such) to make much more order in this area, but I guess politicos are busy with more interesting things than getting some data in order.

Re: The Massachusetts Software Tax

#155

Post by anigbrowl »

cinquemb wrote: post #148
anigbrowl wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, everyone includes all the people who live in a district that complain about too much government and object to things like national curricula or accounting standards or whatever. That can include bureaucrats but isn't necessarily limited to them. This sort of thing is one of my interests and I even sort of enjoy digging through budget documents to root out these nuggets of information. Financial analysts and peopl…

Fair enough. My interests in trying to work with data like this came from my difficulty in finding data I could mine "easily" on municipal/city bonds as apposed to equity funds portfolio companies. Part of me thinks that if some people were given a set of tools or a place they could go where they could make an more informed decision (with clicks of buttons and simple displays) about their 401k's, Roth IRAs, 403 B's o…

I think that's absolutely worth doing, and I think the lack of agreemtn on (or demand for) universal standards on this is major political failure. But commercially, there's probably more of an audience in the B2B sector selling this kind of data to institutional investors and so on than offering it up to the general public - although perhaps the premium customers could pay for up-tothe-minute analysis for market timing, bond auctions and so on, and after a short window the information could be shared with the general public for free.

Re: The Massachusetts Software Tax

#156

Post by damian2000 »

tehwalrus wrote: post #25

This is insane . Either add a sales tax (fixed %) to all B2B transactions (like UK VAT, which you're exempt from if you're tiny) or just don't. This minefield of regulations about what's taxable and what isn't will just make it much more expensive to sell things, as people pay for lawyers/accountants to figure out what "tax" to add to every outgoing invoice. Since this will decrease consumption, it will reduce other…

Australia used to have a system like the US model - all of the states had their own arcane sales tax laws. This was scrapped in 2000 in favour of a blanket 10% goods and services tax. It didn't make everyone happy but it was a lot easier to manage. Also, imports under AU$1000 are exempt from it, which means online sellers like Amazon who ship from the US or UK are fairly popular.

Re: The Massachusetts Software Tax

#157

Post by mjn »

redthrowaway wrote: post #106
rwl wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, you're trolling here, and if I could downvote you for it, I would; but since I can't, let me try to raise the level of discussion: > I would prefer to pay for services I use I invite you, sometime, to think about which services you really use, and try to figure out how much it would cost to purchase each of them if you were doing so on your own. Don't forget: police protection, fire protection, military protectio…

He's not trolling, it's just a kneejerk libertarian comment. There's a strong thread among the more vehement economic libertarians of taxation being theft enforced by the government's monopoly on force. It's a bit silly, but it's also a sincerely held belief.

If not deliberate trolling, that kind of comment is at the very least low-information. It could be replaced by a shell script that looks for the word "taxes" and randomly replies with a short but strongly worded comment that taxation is theft.

Compare: whenever a commenter mentions property, user proudhon99 shows up to write a one-line comment that property is theft. Yes, he legitimately believes it, and his position is actually less absurd than the libertarian's, but comments that could be replicated by parody bots are not that useful.

Re: The Massachusetts Software Tax

#158

Post by Daniel_Newby »

troels wrote: post #59
chalst wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you think this only applies to software developers? I provide editorial and publishing consulting - I don't write code to sell, but I do configure and patch other people's code. Am I covered by this law? Well, I guess I am. Easiest solution for me: don't accept clients in Massachusetts.

Oh you can accept them alright. Just recharge the extra tax to the customer, if they're from MA. You don't even need to worry about if it applies to that particular invoice or not - Just add it in any case.

Assessing a fee under false color of law is a serious crime.

Re: The Massachusetts Software Tax

#159

Post by vacri »

thecodeore wrote: post #142
rwl wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, you're trolling here, and if I could downvote you for it, I would; but since I can't, let me try to raise the level of discussion: > I would prefer to pay for services I use I invite you, sometime, to think about which services you really use, and try to figure out how much it would cost to purchase each of them if you were doing so on your own. Don't forget: police protection, fire protection, military protectio…

I do not believe, support, or accept "democracy" or mob rule. I do not believe the "majority" has the moral right to lay claim to my labor or the product there of, nor tell me how to live my life. I believe in Non-Aggression Principle and the voluntary exchange of goods and services You are correct in I do not exist in an island, however I do VOLUNTARILY exchange my labor for goods and services, this is society, not…

What about money? Do you do all your business in BTC, or perhaps thecodollars? Facilitating the exchange of your goods and services is significant in itself.

Incidentally, Vanuatu is a place with zero income taxes (unless you're a landlord), happy people, and good weather. Perhaps you should consider moving there if you want a strict user-pays-for-service system?

Re: The Massachusetts Software Tax

#160

Post by CamperBob2 »

marvin wrote: post #103
thallium205 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It takes some seriously deep-seeded, institutionalized indoctrination assaulting your mind through most of your life to believe taxation is not theft. If you do not pay your tax, violence is threatened and will be brought upon you if you do not comply. This is theft. It does not matter if the thief uses it for altruism. It does not matter if the thief forces roads and other services upon you by outlawing competition.…

You are free to go off-grid and live in the woods, free from the shackles of taxed services like roads, police protection and tap water. If you still make enough money to pay tax, you'll still technically be breaking the law - but I doubt anyone is going to come into the forest to put you in jail. So in practice you'll be free and clear. You could also go to a nation in sub-Saharan Africa where there is in effect no…

I'm sure glad I don't get all the police I pay for.
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