5 ms·

This is the taxmans dream - all transactions recorded and traceable.

cperciva 11y ago
Being able to see every time a dollar (or krone, I suppose) changed hands isn't enough for the taxman though. Last month Tarsnap Backup Inc. wrote me a cheque, and there's a very clear electronic trail showing the money moving from Tarsnap's account to mine. But that electronic trail says nothing about the reason why the money moved. If Tarsnap was paying me a bonus, that would be taxable income. But if Tarsnap was merely reimbursing me for expenses I paid on my personal credit card, that's not taxable. The taxman can only tell the difference when they turn up at my door and ask to see my records showing why that money was paid. (The answer, incidentally, is that Tarsnap was reimbursing me for the AWS bill I paid via my credit card. Tarsnap, being a Canadian small business, can't get a US dollar credit card with a limit high enough to pay its AWS bills, but my personal credit card has a generous limit.)
- beagle3 11y ago
  The taxman would ask you to file that explanation; 4 years down the line, 5 times, to different auditors, at different times, using different forms. You are presumed guilty until you've proved your innocence. And if you've lost the paper trail - well, then, it's a taxable bonus. (Canada might not yet be this bad - no experience there. But I've filed taxes in 3 countries that are)
  - icebraining 11y ago
    Around here, you're always required to file those records every month (electronically). Don't assume this gets you off the hook from having to produce them later to an audit, though - it's still your responsibility to hold on to them.
- CarlHoerberg 11y ago
  (Most often you can pay AWS by wire transfer if you contact them)
  - cperciva 11y ago
    Yes, I've talked to them and nearly ended up going the wire transfer route. But using a credit card and reimbursing myself ended up being easier and cheaper.
- blumkvist 11y ago
  Checks are not electronic. If you shop at a store, the transaction record says what items you've bought. Nobody can stop the tax authorities demanding you to attach an invoice to every transaction a business makes. It would be trivially easy for businesses to implement it nowadays with the software they have. Many businesses do it this way already, if they use their invoicing vendor (xero,quickbooks) to accept the payment as well.
beagle3 11y ago
And also a dream of every dictatorship and totalitarian. Other than recordable or traceable, you quickly get to a point where one keypress is all that is needed to freeze someone's money. All of it. The question of abuse is not of "if", but rather of "when".
- alkonaut 11y ago
  I can't see how it's such a big difference from today? There is no way I could get my salary in cash/cheque, the only way I have of accessing my own money is via the bank it is transferred to. 99% of the time, I access it via a debit card at a. Granted, when I get cash I can buy something that can't be traced, but the cash man doesn't really care much what I buy, the VAT is taken from the store. If I was suspected of terrorism or some other crime that meant my assets should be frozen, that is a single push of a button already. I don't have a safe with cash, most people don't. Even if I had, it would be exceedingly hard to live cash-only, as any major purchase done in cash would be affected by money-laundry rules, so the tax man would certainly be informed if I bought e.g. a car cash (If I did so from a dealer I wouldn't be able to do it anonymously).
  - gambiting 11y ago
    Just because you do it that way,doesn't mean everyone does. My parents employ 130 people and they are all paid in cash.
    - alkonaut 11y ago
      That sounds like it's US or at least not north/west Europe. My point is: in Denmark/Sweden/etc, the step to cash-free isn't very big, simply because of what I mentioned: we are more or less cash free already: Salaries are paid to bank accounts and never cash/cheque (cheques don't exist), bills are paid from bank accounts and not cash Cash is tracked by anti money laundry laws and so on and so forth. So unlike in the US those prerequisites are already in place. That is why a) it's not really a giant leap to stop using cash, and b) it's not really a major privacy concern as we are already pretty much completely tracked.
Xixi 11y ago
It is a taxman dream, of course. But I would not be surprised if it was seen as largely positive by most citizens, especially the honest ones (and most citizens are honest by virtue of being salaried, with little to no room for fraud). It depends on the country of course, but tax fraud (or even tax evasion) is rarely seen as a good thing.
stevenjohns 11y ago
Contrasted with the extremist dream of the cash only society, where there is so much corruption and bureaucracy (as a defense method against corruption) that society can't properly function (see Iraq). I personally think a mix of both is good. I'm a supporter of receiving electronic payments from work, with the ability to spend it as paper if I'd want to.
hobarrera 11y ago
And this is exactly why electronic payment has such bad adoption in many places, where tax evasion is the norm (mostly underdeveloped countries, of course).

Being able to see every time a dollar (or krone, I suppose) changed hands isn't enough for the taxman though. Last month Tarsnap Backup Inc. wrote me a cheque, and there's a very clear electronic trail showing the money moving from Tarsnap's account to mine. But that electronic trail says nothing about the reason why the money moved. If Tarsnap was paying me a bonus, that would be taxable income. But if Tarsnap was merely reimbursing me for expenses I paid on my personal credit card, that's not taxable. The taxman can only tell the difference when they turn up at my door and ask to see my records showing why that money was paid. (The answer, incidentally, is that Tarsnap was reimbursing me for the AWS bill I paid via my credit card. Tarsnap, being a Canadian small business, can't get a US dollar credit card with a limit high enough to pay its AWS bills, but my personal credit card has a generous limit.)

beagle3 11y ago
The taxman would ask you to file that explanation; 4 years down the line, 5 times, to different auditors, at different times, using different forms. You are presumed guilty until you've proved your innocence. And if you've lost the paper trail - well, then, it's a taxable bonus. (Canada might not yet be this bad - no experience there. But I've filed taxes in 3 countries that are)
- icebraining 11y ago
  Around here, you're always required to file those records every month (electronically). Don't assume this gets you off the hook from having to produce them later to an audit, though - it's still your responsibility to hold on to them.
CarlHoerberg 11y ago
(Most often you can pay AWS by wire transfer if you contact them)
- cperciva 11y ago
  Yes, I've talked to them and nearly ended up going the wire transfer route. But using a credit card and reimbursing myself ended up being easier and cheaper.
blumkvist 11y ago
Checks are not electronic. If you shop at a store, the transaction record says what items you've bought. Nobody can stop the tax authorities demanding you to attach an invoice to every transaction a business makes. It would be trivially easy for businesses to implement it nowadays with the software they have. Many businesses do it this way already, if they use their invoicing vendor (xero,quickbooks) to accept the payment as well.

beagle3 11y ago

And also a dream of every dictatorship and totalitarian. Other than recordable or traceable, you quickly get to a point where one keypress is all that is needed to freeze someone's money. All of it. The question of abuse is not of "if", but rather of "when".

alkonaut 11y ago
I can't see how it's such a big difference from today? There is no way I could get my salary in cash/cheque, the only way I have of accessing my own money is via the bank it is transferred to. 99% of the time, I access it via a debit card at a. Granted, when I get cash I can buy something that can't be traced, but the cash man doesn't really care much what I buy, the VAT is taken from the store. If I was suspected of terrorism or some other crime that meant my assets should be frozen, that is a single push of a button already. I don't have a safe with cash, most people don't. Even if I had, it would be exceedingly hard to live cash-only, as any major purchase done in cash would be affected by money-laundry rules, so the tax man would certainly be informed if I bought e.g. a car cash (If I did so from a dealer I wouldn't be able to do it anonymously).
- gambiting 11y ago
  Just because you do it that way,doesn't mean everyone does. My parents employ 130 people and they are all paid in cash.
  - alkonaut 11y ago
    That sounds like it's US or at least not north/west Europe. My point is: in Denmark/Sweden/etc, the step to cash-free isn't very big, simply because of what I mentioned: we are more or less cash free already: Salaries are paid to bank accounts and never cash/cheque (cheques don't exist), bills are paid from bank accounts and not cash Cash is tracked by anti money laundry laws and so on and so forth. So unlike in the US those prerequisites are already in place. That is why a) it's not really a giant leap to stop using cash, and b) it's not really a major privacy concern as we are already pretty much completely tracked.

Xixi 11y ago

It is a taxman dream, of course. But I would not be surprised if it was seen as largely positive by most citizens, especially the honest ones (and most citizens are honest by virtue of being salaried, with little to no room for fraud). It depends on the country of course, but tax fraud (or even tax evasion) is rarely seen as a good thing.

stevenjohns 11y ago

Contrasted with the extremist dream of the cash only society, where there is so much corruption and bureaucracy (as a defense method against corruption) that society can't properly function (see Iraq). I personally think a mix of both is good. I'm a supporter of receiving electronic payments from work, with the ability to spend it as paper if I'd want to.

hobarrera 11y ago

And this is exactly why electronic payment has such bad adoption in many places, where tax evasion is the norm (mostly underdeveloped countries, of course).