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SEC charges the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

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Re: SEC charges the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

#181

Post by VLM »

tptacek wrote: post #126
Sebb767 wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If I get pulled over in a Bentley with an expired sticker, I pay the same price as someone in a Kia. The fine should scale with the size of the infraction. If you sticker expires on your car, the infraction is the same severity, no matter the car [0]. ~Hiding a few million vs. hiding a few billion in taxes is a whole different level.~ EDIT: They just hid it for information purposes. Not to avoid tax. Therefore, thi…

Right, I agree. But they didn't hide millions from taxes. They availed themselves of more privacy than the SEC allows for fund managers. If we can articulate the manner in which that inflicted more than 5MM in harm, I think we have a strong case for the fine being too low. But I have no intuition for how to work out the harm these bad filings caused. Do you? As for deterrence: it appears as if the SEC successfully de…

Filing a 13F is essentially a tax upon all market participants, it provides zero benefit to the public. Filing has a financial cost. If the SEC settlement were less than the cost of filing over multiple years, then all rational actors would stop paying to file 13-Fs and simply pay off the SEC every couple years. The middlemen and the pretend regulators both benefit from busywork continuing, so the fee is slightly more than the cost of filing 13-Fs to encourage cooperation.

There's probably a joke in there somewhere about the 13-F process being "securities theater" as compared to the better known IT "security theater" phrase. 13-F is a classic example of "regulation can sometimes be wasteful and inconvenient" therefore anything wasteful or inconvenient can be hand waved away by appeals to "regulation" much like the classic analogy with computer security. See also security theater at airports, plenty of the governmental covid responses, etc.

Re: SEC charges the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

#182

Post by boeingUH60 »

open-paren wrote: post #169
boeingUH60 wrote: post #20

Here's a related random fact: Fidelity, the well-known investment firm, runs donor-advised charitable funds for rich clients that in aggregate constitute America's charity [1]. The three largest recipients from those funds? Harvard University, Stanford University, and the Mormon Church...organizations that aren't in any way hurting for money. I guess people fund what they are familiar with and for prestige. 1- https:…

It's not that mysterious. The Church has "paying a full tithe" as a basic practice of "full membership". Members can use a DAF to pay tithes in stock and save on taxes by not incurring a sale. I know this because I'm an active, tithe-paying member and this was advice that I received from other members. Anyone can set up their own DAF and donate money or securities to it then have the DAF submit the donation to the Ch…

Sure, never said it was mysterious, was just giving an interesting observation. As an aside, the first time I heard much about Mormons was reading the biography of Jon Huntsman, the late billionaire industrialist, whom I really liked. After that, I checked up on some other well-known Mormon entrepreneurs, luminaries, et al., and had some interesting observations.

1) You guys do have a lot of kids. One founder of a well-known fintech startup has 10 kids! Josh James of Domo fame got over 7 if I remember...seems to be common.

2) Ensign Peak has $100 billion+ from member contributions...what do they even use it for because as far as I'm aware, the fund just keeps accumulating?

3) I'm no fan of organized religion (I grew up attending a silly megachurch). But then, I think you guys have your things in order for a large religious organization...most people I know would get corrupt and power-drunk if they were in the position of Russell Nelson and the other leaders.

4) Utah has a problem with MLM schemes, which I assume is because of strong familial ties that preys seek to exploit...anything being done about this?

I hope I'm not intrusive with my questions. Just trying to understand how you guys run despite being a diehard atheist.

Re: SEC charges the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

#183

Post by emodendroket »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #57
emodendroket wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, but I meant it’s likely to be portrayed as an out-of-control regulatory apparatus going after religious conservatives even though they used the kid gloves.

The fundies only care about their sect. As far as they're concerned LDS is a bunch of apostates.

Heretics more like but I think you underestimate the capacity for cynical alliances of convenience.

Re: SEC charges the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

#184

Post by skissane »

bbatha wrote: post #125
skissane wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The details vary from country to country, of course, but some of the tax exemptions which religious groups get are actually just standard exemptions available to all non-profits, or all charities. English law has long defined "advancing religion" as a "charitable purpose". The Charitable Uses Act of 1601 (aka the Statute of Elizabeth) included "the repair of... churches" as a charitable purpose, and later case law to…

> They can operate like any other non-profit and be subject to that set of rules, or they can be a regular corporation and be subject to a different set of rules. Its pretty clear that OP just wants them to register as 501c3's or similar not force them to pay taxes in general

If OP just wants religions “to register as 501c3’s”, then I believe they already have almost what they want. From what I understand, the principal tax exemption available to religious groups under US federal income tax law is 501(c)(3)

It is true that religious groups get their 501(c)(3) status automatically without having to apply for it to the IRS - but changing that rule wouldn’t lead to them paying any more tax, since if they do apply the IRS almost always just grants it anyway.

Re: SEC charges the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

#185

Post by dqpb »

japhib wrote: post #133
dqpb wrote: post #77

[flagged]

This is not a logical conclusion. It's like saying, if Jeff Bezos is really so rich, why are Amazon warehouse employees not paid better? He must actually be poor and can only afford to pay people low salaries.

Employees are forced to accept a bad deal due to asymmetrical market dynamics. Without the job they would be worse off until they find a replacement. The person with the money (Bezos) has all the power.

Not so with church members. If they stopped attending they would have more money. They are the ones with the power. So why would a grown adult willfully hand over their money to an organization that already has all the money it could possibly need?

A better counterpoint would be - Why do people keep paying $60 worth of streaming video subscriptions per month when the content delivered is increasingly just lame irrelevant re-hashed bullshit?

Re: SEC charges the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

#186

Post by dbrueck »

mikeyouse wrote: post #174
woolcap wrote: post #131

Some info about how the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints uses its donations: https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/humanitaria... I suspect most of its investments are targeted towards the same ends.

The part about welfare for those not of their faith was just in the news due to the way we do block grants to states to fund welfare services.. the state of Utah largely hands off their program work to the LDS Church which is pretty unfortunate when they make support contingent on joining their church, going so far to tell people they won't be provided with support that's Federally required unless they get baptized i…

Actually, the church's policy is to help everyone regardless of their religious affiliation, and anyone can get food and other help from the storehouses mentioned in the article. The help sometimes includes even cash, but it's far from just a spend-this-however-you-want blank check. That money typically comes from local donations, so the people administering the relief have an obligation to be careful about it.

No doubt there are some inconsistencies in how it gets handed out, and it's unfortunate that apparently some people had some experiences that included deviations from the church's policy, but for every person in that article with a bad experience you can easily find 1000 people who were blown away that the church helped them without any sort of pressure to join that church.

(fwiw, the Salt Lake Tribune has been writing stuff like this for 150 years - sometimes it adds value, but often it's disingenuous)

Re: SEC charges the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

#187

Post by dfxm12 »

lcall wrote: post #180
dfxm12 wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(Thoughtful comments appreciated with downvotes; thanks.) OK, I'll bite. The response doesn't answer the question. What "mistakes" are being referenced? Who made them? This is a yes/no question. Don't get fooled by grammar tricks, like the ambiguous voice of made or the ambiguous reference to mistakes.

The full statement (linked above) covers it better than the short quote.

It does not, but I'm not sure if that matters as your downvoted comment didn't suggest that you were referring to anything besides the bit you quoted.

Re: SEC charges the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

#188

Post by VLM »

krapp wrote: post #41
jjtheblunt wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Simpler : if churches get tax-exempt status, then they are bound to the state in receiving that status, and violate separation of church and state? I haven't been able to find where tax exempt status for churches is established, and I've looked, but not my area of expertise at all. What if the goverment were to just stop giving churches tax exempt status? (edit: clearer)

Its basis is that taxation is a form of coercion, and government having the ability to coerce or even persecute religious organizations through taxation would violate the separation of church and state. I personally think the incestuous menage-a-trois between corporate interests, the Republican party and Conservative Christianity is a bigger threat to liberty, but whatever.

Somehow I don't think abolishment of the Johnson Amendment would result in less religious involvement in politics.

It's a very large interconnected system.

The main effect of eliminating the tax free status for religious institutions would be a push toward charity involvement where instead of the charity work being part of the church, the church would be a part of the charity (think basement soup kitchens and the like). Instead of having "St Mary's church and Soup Kitchen" you'd have a big legal shuffle that accomplishes nothing resulting in org titles like "St Mary's Soup Kitchen and Related Worship Services"

Unless they're proposing complete elimination of all tax-exempt status for all orgs including charities and similar orgs. Which would be interesting to think about but probably impractical?

Re: SEC charges the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

#189

Post by not_your_mentat »

Watching the Tabernacle choir sing at Trump's inauguration was the act that broke my faith in the church. Since then, I've come to see the church as just another corporation. Too bad the corporation isn't governed by their own scripture, what with the "render unto Caesar that which is Cesar's" thing and whatnot.

From the articles of faith (canonized LDS scripture):

12 We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law.

13 We believe in being honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous, and in doing good to all men; indeed, we may say that we follow the admonition of Paul—We believe all things, we hope all things, we have endured many things, and hope to be able to endure all things. If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things.

Everyone is playing the game of power. Some people are really good at it.

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