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Funny how US government constantly shields itself from transparency, but demands it, going as far as to have banks report any transactions over $600 to the IRS.

Funny how US government constantly shields itself from transparency, but demands it, going as far as to have banks report any transactions over $600 to the IRS. Rules for me, but not for thee.

AlotOfReading 5y ago
I'm not sure what corporations you're regularly interacting with, but the government is one of the most open bureaucracies I have to deal with. In principle, virtually anything that isn't national security or personal information can be FOIA'd for a nominal fee. If you don't like the treatment, there's usually a variety of processes to appeal or shortcut the bureaucracy, ranging from paperwork to senators. Compare to Google, where the only way to get a rationale seems to be complaining about it on HN and hoping the PM responds and the only semi-effective feedback mechanism is massive public outcry.
- octoberfranklin 5y ago
  > virtually anything that isn't national security So basically the unimportant stuff. Like historical employee cafeteria menus and janitorial schedules. Gee, great.
  - otterley 5y ago
    That’s not true at all. A significant amount of deep journalistic reporting is based on information provided by the government in response to FOIA requests.
    - encryptluks2 5y ago
      Unless you want to listen to Presidential phone calls to other world oligarchs.
judge2020 5y ago
> any transactions over $600 to the IRS Pedantic but the change was that any P2P service has to give you a form to fill out if you send or receive more than $600 in a calendar year. Since 1970 with the Bank Secrecy Act, banks have had to report ACH/cash/wire deposits over $10,000 to the IRS and are at their own liberty to report anything lower.
smt88 5y ago
You could not be more wrong here. Government entities have far less privacy than any non-government entity. You can FOIA every email of most government employees. You can even FOIA IRS records.
- alphabetting 5y ago
  FOIA can be good but agencies routinely hold up information for years beyond the point of the info still having any use to the original person requesting it https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/2016/oct/04/state-department-has-taken-three-years-and-countin/ https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/2016/oct/04/state-dep...
sbierwagen 5y ago
>Eschew flamebait. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Funny how US government constantly shields itself from transparency, but demands it, going as far as to have banks report any transactions over $600 to the IRS. Rules for me, but not for thee.

AlotOfReading 5y ago

I'm not sure what corporations you're regularly interacting with, but the government is one of the most open bureaucracies I have to deal with. In principle, virtually anything that isn't national security or personal information can be FOIA'd for a nominal fee. If you don't like the treatment, there's usually a variety of processes to appeal or shortcut the bureaucracy, ranging from paperwork to senators. Compare to Google, where the only way to get a rationale seems to be complaining about it on HN and hoping the PM responds and the only semi-effective feedback mechanism is massive public outcry.

octoberfranklin 5y ago
> virtually anything that isn't national security So basically the unimportant stuff. Like historical employee cafeteria menus and janitorial schedules. Gee, great.
- otterley 5y ago
  That’s not true at all. A significant amount of deep journalistic reporting is based on information provided by the government in response to FOIA requests.
  - encryptluks2 5y ago
    Unless you want to listen to Presidential phone calls to other world oligarchs.

judge2020 5y ago

> any transactions over $600 to the IRS Pedantic but the change was that any P2P service has to give you a form to fill out if you send or receive more than $600 in a calendar year. Since 1970 with the Bank Secrecy Act, banks have had to report ACH/cash/wire deposits over $10,000 to the IRS and are at their own liberty to report anything lower.

smt88 5y ago

You could not be more wrong here. Government entities have far less privacy than any non-government entity. You can FOIA every email of most government employees. You can even FOIA IRS records.

alphabetting 5y ago
FOIA can be good but agencies routinely hold up information for years beyond the point of the info still having any use to the original person requesting it https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/2016/oct/04/state-department-has-taken-three-years-and-countin/ https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/2016/oct/04/state-dep...

sbierwagen 5y ago

>Eschew flamebait. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html