4 ms·

I wonder if changing this from a percentage to an amount (say, the $10,000 mentioned above) would close this loophole.

• paulsutter 9y ago
  Sounds like Chesterton’s fence. Would you want your NVIDIA holdings a public record?
  • kuschku 9y ago
    In several nordic countries, all citizen's tax filings are public record. I certainly don't see anything wrong with it.
    • dmitrygr 9y ago
      Ok, let me explain: You are in Nordic country N, and your filings show your income of $X (a high number). Your relatives A,B,C live in country R, which features large amount of mobsters. Said mobsters learn of the value of X via N's public info system, and make lives of A,B,C uncomfortable or dangerous or downright kidnap them to receive a chunk of $X. And no, A,B,C cannot always move for a variety of reasons.
      • mieseratte 9y ago
        You're not wrong. In fact, as a human, you're very right. It's possible such a law would have very negative externalities. However, a nation really only owes loyalty to its people. You can't stop an otherwise positive because some people might get hurt. We'd get nothing done in that case.
        • hueving 9y ago
          How are public tax filings a positive?
          • StudentStuff 9y ago
            It provides transparency and auditability, just like how nearly all court records are public. There are many retail businesses I worked with in the past that were tax cheats, gave up reporting 'em since I couldn't consistently tell what they did and did not report. Sometimes sales tax from the 6th register (which was on a separate database) would be reported, other times not. I know they're still pocketing $5k to $10k a month in sales tax at one business.
            • hueving 9y ago
              We're talking about personal tax records. I don't see how personal tax records being transparent provides any upside. It only paints a target on your back for criminals.
              • mieseratte 9y ago
                How about this one, when I joined a startup the founder had made certain claims and impressions about who he was, the funding he was putting in, etc. As it turns out this man was a liar, confidence man, and tax cheat. Had there been open tax records, I could have (in)validated some of his claims and saved myself severals years of struggle and many thousands in subsequent debt. It's not just for criminals to leverage. It's for the common man to use to reduce information asymmetry and, this one might be a bit dystopian, but help self-police that everyone pays their share.
      • kuschku 9y ago
        That's already a potential issue today, and these societies have decided to do it anyway, because they care more about this than your potential risks.
    • Trundle 9y ago
      Gold diggers