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The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

money.msn.com

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Re: The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

#41

Post by throwaway420 »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #18

Holy lucre ! 300 billion in lost revenue . That has to be wrong. Even at a tax rate of 30% (way higher than the US effective rate) that implies one trillion dollars each year gets hidden from the IRS. That will solve every budgetary crisis going.

Except you forgot to fast forward to the part where politicians, having even more funds at their disposal to try to gain more power, decide to use that extra money to increase spending even more.

And contrary to the faux Mother Theresa like notion of government that some people like to project, that money will not mostly go towards relatively positive things like feeding hungry children, giving a helping hand to out of work people, or building libraries. This extra cash will mostly go to agencies like the NSA to spy on people more, subsidies to big farming companies, payoffs to the right corrupt dictators, to the FBI to throw more people in cages for consuming a plant, or to corrupt military contractors to build more useless bombs for the next war.

The 16th Amendment (income tax) was only instituted in 1913 and the whole income tax is based on the disgraceful concept that you don't own the fruits of your labor but the government gets it before you do and only allows you whatever cut of it that they can decide on. The US was incredibly prosperous up until that time and was completely functional mostly running on limited tariffs. We would be even more prosperous today without the government sucking up such a large portion of creative wealth that exists in this country.

The IRS should flat out be abolished not just for economic reasons, but also for political reasons. It is unacceptable that they are spying on people even more and that their power can be used to target political enemies.

Re: The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

#42

Post by euroclydon »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #36

This is an older article. One of the key takeaways is that Congress in 2008 gave the IRS the capability to dive into your personal affairs online in ways that even the justice department can't (without a warrant). They only need to view you as somebody of interest. Better still, the exact nature of all this -- wait for it -- is a secret. The long-term trend here is pretty clear. Congress has the Big Data hammer out,…

Terrorism is bad. Tax cheating is a serous loss of revenue. Online privacy is a much more abstract concern for citizens than having their entire office building blown up or even a few tens of billions of annual tax revenue being lost.

You know how people complain about the DMV? That's because they don't have to wait in line as long at their bank. It's the same thing with the IRS and Big Data, when a government agency doesn't use the latest technology, they can rightfully be accused of being antiquated. It just so happens that people are much more supportive of shorter DMV lines than they are of paying sales tax on Amazon purchases -- go figure.

Furthermore, if government uses big data to catch polluters, that good. But if government uses big data to catch someone planning a bombing, that's bad?

Re: The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

#43

Post by uptown »

marknutter wrote: post #25
alan_cx wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, spent on sorting the country out.

We've been "sorting the country out" for hundreds of years.

That's why we've moved onto sorting other countries out! Afghanistan, Iraq. Next up - Syria!

Re: The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

#44

Post by Shivetya »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #36

This is an older article. One of the key takeaways is that Congress in 2008 gave the IRS the capability to dive into your personal affairs online in ways that even the justice department can't (without a warrant). They only need to view you as somebody of interest. Better still, the exact nature of all this -- wait for it -- is a secret. The long-term trend here is pretty clear. Congress has the Big Data hammer out,…

Last I read the IRS is not part of the legislative branch, the NSA being part of the DOD may not be as well. Which mostly seems to be true from the stonewalling both agencies are able to do in regards to Congress.

You have to wonder, if an agency of the government is not answerable to Congress who represents us, then why do they exist?

Re: The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

#45

Post by dragonwriter »

throwaway420 wrote: post #41
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #18

Holy lucre ! 300 billion in lost revenue . That has to be wrong. Even at a tax rate of 30% (way higher than the US effective rate) that implies one trillion dollars each year gets hidden from the IRS. That will solve every budgetary crisis going.

Except you forgot to fast forward to the part where politicians, having even more funds at their disposal to try to gain more power, decide to use that extra money to increase spending even more. And contrary to the faux Mother Theresa like notion of government that some people like to project, that money will not mostly go towards relatively positive things like feeding hungry children, giving a helping hand to out…

> The 16th Amendment (income tax) was only instituted in 1913

The 16th Amendment was instituted in 1913, but the first US federal income taxes were adopted during the Civil War, and the first peacetime federal income taxes were adopted in the 1894.

The 16th Amendment wasn't passed to give Congress the power to collect taxes on income, it was passed mainly to expand Congress well-established existing power in that domain to include the power to tax income from on sales of real and personal property without apportionment according to population as a direct tax (and to avoid future similar problems that might apply to some other sources of income), in response to Pollock v. Farmers' Loan and Trust, 157 U.S. 429 (1895).

Re: The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

#46

Post by twoodfin »

gregd wrote: post #37
pathy wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it doesn't. Corporate tax legislation is not the same as personal tax legislation, therefore a comparison is irrelevant. Even if corporations would be treated as people, as long as the legislation is different it does not make sense to compare the two. You may argue that tax rates are too high or low for both or that there are too many loopholes but that is a different discussion. I don't think anyone actually wan…

Just to be clear, I'm not in favor of Corporate Personhood, by any stretch of the imagination. But if corporations want to apply the Constitution as if they're people, I think it's fair for me to apply the corporate tax code to my person.

What's wrong with corporate personhood? Without it, the ACLU, a corporation, doesn't have free speech rights without the consent of Congress.

Re: The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

#47

Post by glurgh »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #36

This is an older article. One of the key takeaways is that Congress in 2008 gave the IRS the capability to dive into your personal affairs online in ways that even the justice department can't (without a warrant). They only need to view you as somebody of interest. Better still, the exact nature of all this -- wait for it -- is a secret. The long-term trend here is pretty clear. Congress has the Big Data hammer out,…

Just standby for the next travesty.

What's the specific travesty here? The IRS already looks at and analyzes your private financial data both as reported by you and others and this is generally considered acceptable and a necessary part of them doing their job. So say now they noticed you reported $20k in gross annual income but are buying Ferraris on eBay. It seems pretty reasonable to assume, from that piece of public data that you might be mis-stating your taxable income.

Re: The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

#48

Post by josh2600 »

euroclydon wrote: post #42
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #36

This is an older article. One of the key takeaways is that Congress in 2008 gave the IRS the capability to dive into your personal affairs online in ways that even the justice department can't (without a warrant). They only need to view you as somebody of interest. Better still, the exact nature of all this -- wait for it -- is a secret. The long-term trend here is pretty clear. Congress has the Big Data hammer out,…

Terrorism is bad. Tax cheating is a serous loss of revenue. Online privacy is a much more abstract concern for citizens than having their entire office building blown up or even a few tens of billions of annual tax revenue being lost. You know how people complain about the DMV? That's because they don't have to wait in line as long at their bank. It's the same thing with the IRS and Big Data, when a government agency…

This is an absurdly reductive argument.

No one is saying the governments use of Big Data is bad except in the circumstances where our government sees fit to hide its usage or utility even when it directly impacts its citizenry.

It is not the use of modern technology or even the goals, which many on HN will admit are admirable. It is about the path used to reach the end just as much as it is about the end.

I believe that we have very smart law enforcement officials who don't need to routinely violate the privacy of Americans to do their jobs.

Re: The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

#49

Post by university »

euroclydon wrote: post #42
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #36

This is an older article. One of the key takeaways is that Congress in 2008 gave the IRS the capability to dive into your personal affairs online in ways that even the justice department can't (without a warrant). They only need to view you as somebody of interest. Better still, the exact nature of all this -- wait for it -- is a secret. The long-term trend here is pretty clear. Congress has the Big Data hammer out,…

Terrorism is bad. Tax cheating is a serous loss of revenue. Online privacy is a much more abstract concern for citizens than having their entire office building blown up or even a few tens of billions of annual tax revenue being lost. You know how people complain about the DMV? That's because they don't have to wait in line as long at their bank. It's the same thing with the IRS and Big Data, when a government agency…

That recaptured loss of revenue will only be used to fund the military and further oppress the people.

There are entire families on the streets and cities like Detroit are crumbling, yet tax payer money is siphoned into more prisons and spy technology.

Re: The IRS has upgraded its technology to track virtually everything you do online

#50

Post by glurgh »

university wrote: post #49
euroclydon wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Terrorism is bad. Tax cheating is a serous loss of revenue. Online privacy is a much more abstract concern for citizens than having their entire office building blown up or even a few tens of billions of annual tax revenue being lost. You know how people complain about the DMV? That's because they don't have to wait in line as long at their bank. It's the same thing with the IRS and Big Data, when a government agency…

That recaptured loss of revenue will only be used to fund the military and further oppress the people. There are entire families on the streets and cities like Detroit are crumbling, yet tax payer money is siphoned into more prisons and spy technology.

Isn't the logical conclusion of this (factually unsupported) argument that we should just stop paying and collecting taxes? You might as well give up on having an organized society if your criteria are things like 'no tax cent should be spent on something I don't like'.
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