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How Equifax Became a Private IRS

mattstoller.substack.com

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Re: How Equifax Became a Private IRS

#161

Post by SketchySeaBeast »

xwolfi wrote: post #103
kornhole wrote: post #50

Since I can't opt out of this and all the scoundrels can see it anyway, I think I should just post my salary on my Linkedin page. If everybody did that, it would undercut this business and bring to light the inequities to the common people.

You underestimate dishonesty in the population: having your pay exposed may force your company to reduce it to the lowest common denominator to avoid all the cries by people who simply shouldnt be paid like you (age, experience, output, knowledge criticality, all these things people dont wanna hear)

While I don't like your point in general, feels like a scenario meant to scare people into not sharing information, I'm wondering how age or experience are factors independent of output that should define your pay. Seems to me if you're capable of producing equivalent output (considering both volume and quality) it shouldn't matter how old or experienced you are.

Re: How Equifax Became a Private IRS

#162

Post by connor11528 »

phpisthebest wrote: post #150
jasonjayr wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? Government answers to it's people. Equifax answers to it's shareholders. IRS already has that info. The people have the power to control and influence how that data is handled, and distributed. We have no power to compel Equifax to do anything.

[flagged]

Matt addresses this in the article directly:

> Generally speaking, people would get really upset if the IRS shared our tax information for a fee. Effectively, Equifax is doing that, because for most people, employment and income is our tax information. But since it’s a private monopoly, the anti-government types don’t notice or care.

...

> It’s perhaps no exaggeration to note that Equifax is a quasi-governmental agency, a monopoly provider of evidence that you work, where you work, and what you make. If there’s an error, or if someone lies about you, too bad. If Equifax itself is paid to harm you, too bad. If a government agency gets the wrong data and denies you assistance or screws up your immigration status, that’s on you, well, you have limited to no rights in this situation. In some ways, you might have more to fear from Equifax than the IRS.

Re: How Equifax Became a Private IRS

#163

Post by maxfurman »

xattt wrote: post #121
piyh wrote: post #44

I've worked on the data feeds for TWN in a large company's payroll system. If I remember right they don't just get how much money you made but the line by line check level data. Your pay data probably goes out to 14 different vendors on any given pay period. What amaze me about payroll was how accurate the data was on average, despite having wild amounts of new regulatory, healthcare, union, and pay program complexit…

> A surprising amount of money is directed by some lady in a payroll department making $40k with vlookup and 30 excel files on their desktop. I wonder if these people understand their value to an organization.

In my experience they do not, or they believe that they are still not as valuable to the org as the org is to them.

Re: How Equifax Became a Private IRS

#164

Post by noughtme »

minton wrote: post #147
college_physics wrote: post #124

The final act of the dystopic digital transition we are witnessing is when the (until recently ringfenced) information flows of the broader financial system start getting commingled with the other digital activity already being collected and monitored. With the headlong rush to eliminate physical cash soon there will be no opt-out whatsoever. As the world of old oligopolies dies and a worse one emerges, the grotesque…

I think people underestimate the importance of physical cash. It’s annoying, sure, but it affords a type of freedom that won’t be replaced once lost. I wish more people understood this. Sadly, most people seem willing to trade a tiny bit of convenience today for a worse future tomorrow—for example, the tipless, cash-only coffee shop on the HN front page. I guess, like smokers, people don’t believe there’ll be consequ…

The best analogy i've heard for digital currency is not that digital currency is the automobile to cash's horse drawn carriage, but that cash is a bicycle. both can (and should) co exist. the low tech cash is a better solution for many problems, and people without access to digital currency, but it risks being displaced by lobbyists and needs to be protected by the efforts of private citizens.

Re: How Equifax Became a Private IRS

#165

Post by Tangurena2 »

Roark66 wrote: post #137

Seriously, is it true equifax in US "sells information about how much you earn" to anyone or is the article horribly misleading? I don't know about US, but some time ago I had dealt with Equifax in UK (when getting a car loan for example, then when renting a flat) and I was told by the paperwork I was given to sign authorising them to run "a credit check" they'll get the following info only: - confirmation of your de…

The point behind the GDPR was that you own the data about yourself. And if the data is incorrect, you are able to get it corrected. In contrast, in the US, you own none of the data about yourself - many court decisions have basically ruled that whoever owns the computer (inside which the data is stored) owns that data. And if the data is wrong, only in certain limited areas (such as credit history) are you able to get it corrected. Thanks to Brexit, your country is migrating towards the US idea of data ownership.

Re: How Equifax Became a Private IRS

#166

Post by connor11528 »

orev wrote: post #127

While the Work Number is a horrible, anti-capitalist product, I can’t take seriously an article that keeps repeating the premise that having a monopoly is illegal. It just isn’t. It’d be illegal to use monopoly power to prevent others from competing, but that’s a different thing.

That's why he talks about barriers to entry and market power because using those things to prevent competition is illegal. Sherman Act is actually a criminal statue that can put executives behind bars. There's also the Clayton Act and Robinson Patman act that ban forms of monopolization and price discrimination.

It's up to the courts to determine what's reasonable.

> Section 2 of the Sherman Act makes it unlawful for a company to "monopolize, or attempt to monopolize," trade or commerce. As that law has been interpreted, it is not illegal for a company to have a monopoly, to charge "high prices," or to try to achieve a monopoly position by what might be viewed by some as particularly aggressive methods. The law is violated only if the company tries to maintain or acquire a monopoly through unreasonable methods. For the courts, a key factor in determining what is unreasonable is whether the practice has a legitimate business justification.

https://www.ftc.gov/advice-guidance/competition-guidance/gui...

Re: How Equifax Became a Private IRS

#167

Post by Tangurena2 »

nimbius wrote: post #2

A cogent argument could.be made that transunion, Equifax, and other big private credit clearinghouses act as direct agents of an unspoken american "social credit" system in which the credit score denies housing and employment to those who refuse to or cannot conform to a largely invisible tome of rules. These agents are then unpoliced as they serve capitalisms direct need for an underclass. Full disclosure: I am a co…

Additionally, many executives are virulently opposed to people working multiple jobs and are using things like The Work Number to identify and fire remote workers who have more than one job.

Re: How Equifax Became a Private IRS

#168

Post by pavlov »

Roark66 wrote: post #137

Seriously, is it true equifax in US "sells information about how much you earn" to anyone or is the article horribly misleading? I don't know about US, but some time ago I had dealt with Equifax in UK (when getting a car loan for example, then when renting a flat) and I was told by the paperwork I was given to sign authorising them to run "a credit check" they'll get the following info only: - confirmation of your de…

The UK still retains EU data protection laws whereas the US essentially never had any.

Having lived in both countries, the American companies are totally flagrant in how they sell and abuse your personal data. Banks will sell your credit card transactions to advertisers, for example. The UK credit score was a reasonable and stable evaluation of my credit-worthiness based on data from my bank, but its American counterpart is a gamified setup that goes up and down randomly every month and is seemingly designed to make people take unnecessary debt. And so on.

Re: How Equifax Became a Private IRS

#169

Post by isleyaardvark »

xwolfi wrote: post #103
kornhole wrote: post #50

Since I can't opt out of this and all the scoundrels can see it anyway, I think I should just post my salary on my Linkedin page. If everybody did that, it would undercut this business and bring to light the inequities to the common people.

You underestimate dishonesty in the population: having your pay exposed may force your company to reduce it to the lowest common denominator to avoid all the cries by people who simply shouldnt be paid like you (age, experience, output, knowledge criticality, all these things people dont wanna hear)

If that were true, employers would encourage exposing pay to reduce labor costs.

Re: How Equifax Became a Private IRS

#170

Post by [deleted] »

refurb wrote: post #117
33955985 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And you can opt out. Don’t use credit at all. Nope. Whether you use credit or not, the credit bureaus collect information about you and share that with all manner of other companies, including employers. Also these systems have inherent racial biases. https://www.forbes.com/advisor/credit-cards/from-inherent-ra...

But if you don’t use credit the system any rating has no impact on your life? Again, this seems like people want low interest borrowing without the “icky” problem of having to answer for their past failure to pay debt. The world doesn’t work that way.

[deleted]
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