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You're trying to become a charitable organization 501(c)(3) but in reality, I think you're probably a social club 501(c)(7) and I'm sure the IRS feels the same way too.

Look into the IRS's Tax Expemtion for Social Clubs

• Exemption Requirements
• Application for Recognition of Exemption
• Filing Requirements
• Unrelated Business Income Tax
• Solicitation Notice

You're trying to become a charitable organization 501(c)(3) but in reality, I think you're probably a social club 501(c)(7) and I'm sure the IRS feels the same way too.

Look into the IRS's Tax Expemtion for Social Clubs

• Exemption Requirements
• Application for Recognition of Exemption
• Filing Requirements
• Unrelated Business Income Tax
• Solicitation Notice

You're trying to become a charitable organization 501(c)(3) but in reality, I think you're probably a social club 501(c)(7) and I'm sure the IRS feels the same way too.

Look into the IRS's Tax Expemtion for Social Clubs

• Exemption Requirements
• Application for Recognition of Exemption
• Filing Requirements
• Unrelated Business Income Tax
• Solicitation Notice

I believe that is incorrect; the United States issues Federal Reserve Notes (bills, and I believe coins also) which are backed mostly by gold or gold certificates. The US government Treasury holds quite a bit of gold.

The US Treasury Dept has a FAQ that explains this. See "What are Federal Reserve notes and how are they different from United States notes?", which specifically states:

Congress has specified that a Federal Reserve Bank must hold collateral equal in value to the Federal Reserve notes that the Bank receives. This collateral is chiefly gold certificates and United States securities. This provides backing for the note issue.

I believe that is incorrect; the United States issues Federal Reserve Notes (bills, and I believe coins also) which are backed mostly by gold or gold certificates. The US government Treasury holds quite a bit of gold.

The US Treasury Dept has a FAQ that explains this. See "What are Federal Reserve notes and how are they different from United States notes?", which specifically states:

Congress has specified that a Federal Reserve Bank must hold collateral equal in value to the Federal Reserve notes that the Bank receives. This collateral is chiefly gold certificates and United States securities. This provides backing for the note issue.

Businesses or individuals can refuse to accept cash. See the answer on the US Treasury web site.

"I thought that United States currency was legal tender for all debts. Some businesses or governmental agencies say that they will only accept checks, money orders or credit cards as payment, and others will only accept currency notes in denominations of $20 or smaller. Isn't this illegal?"

"The pertinent portion of law that applies to your question is the Coinage Act of 1965, specifically Section 102. This is now found in section 392 of Title 31 of the United States Code. The law says that: "All coins and currencies of the United States (including Federal Reserve notes and circulating notes of Federal Reserve banks and national banking associations) . . . shall be legal-tender for all debts, public and private, public charges, taxes, duties and dues."

This statute means that all United States money as identified above are a valid and legal offer of payment for debts when tendered to a creditor. There is, however, no Federal law mandating that a person or organization must accept currency or coins as for payment for goods and/or services. For example, a bus line may prohibit payment of fares in pennies or dollar bills. In addition, movie theaters, convenience stores and gas stations may refuse to accept large denomination currency (usually notes above $20) as a matter of policy "

The organizations that prosecute credit card fraud are the FBI and Secret Service. Weird, huh? And they generally don't go after crimes unless they involve a large dollar amount -- i.e. large scam operations. If some kid just found your card, you're basically SOL. But it might be worthwhile to call them and hound them into taking a report.

I did a few web searches, and was unable to find any kind of instructions for reporting fraud to the FBI or secret service. There are a few dead links out there for some FBI reporting form, but it appears to be gone. I wonder if the situation has changed in the last few years? The Secret Service's page on the subject says to contact your CC company, the three credit reporting agencies, and the police. But that obviously will go nowhere as far as criminal prosecution of the theif.

The FTC has a page but it says at the top "the FTC does not resolve individual consumer problems"...looks like the page is just for gathering statistics. I'm sure it's really fucking effective. The FTC also has an Identity theft complaint form and has a checkbox for credit card theft, but again it says "the FTC does not resolve individual consumer problems...".

So, it appears that the government quietly approves of credit card fraud. This sucks. This really sucks. We need a new system so badly...

--Bob

Ad hominem much?

Short-term job loss in specific areas are SWIFTLY offset by job growth in others, when true free trade is implemented.

The Cato Institute most assuredly would assert that we do not have this 'true free trade', so I ask you: Does this statement weaken your argument? I can assume that this process is less swift in the absence of this mythical 'true free trade'. I think you might try explaining this concept to some folks in Flint or Dearborn.

Then why don't these people think this is the case between, say, Latin America and the US

There are several factors that weigh in here, and weigh in much heavier than tariffs. One, the majority of nations in South and particularly Central America achieved independence from a colonial power a relatively short time ago, this colonial power left the population poor, uneducated, and without any source of investment for infrastructure, power generation, construction, etc. Then comes large corporations, such as ITT, United Fruit, and a host of others. If these corporations did such wonders for the nations they operated in, why was it necessary for them to be forcibly removed from the places that they were operating in? They had to be removed because the nations and their people were the absolute last in line to benefit from their presence. The economic situation in many Latin American nations has nothing to do with trade barriers and everything to do with capital flight and widespread corruption due to poverty.

Don't be fooled: NO corporation pays taxes, only CONSUMERS.

Very true, as a matter of fact, given how much these entities bilk the government and consequently consumers of their fair share of the tax burden, naturally it's up to you and me the pick up the slack. I'm sure that they would like you to think that they have these overpowering tax burdens, but the reality just doesn't hold up. Corporations get a variety of tax breaks that I sure wish I had. There are corporations out there that haven't paid income tax in years, but don't take my word for it.

Corporate taxes hurt low-income people, the poor, and it makes me sick to know that some college kids "pretend to defend" the poor by advocating high corporate taxes either in the form of direct taxes or trade barriers, when often they are just blindly following a group of jerks with their own hidden agenda.

Sez you. Even if there were no corporate income taxes, and no trade regulations, I guarantee you that low-income people with narrow skills and substandard educational opportunities will still get screwed no matter what country they live in. On the other hand, perhaps these whiny college kids have taken the opportunity that college has given them to look around and analyze what's going on, and find that they don't agree with the way things work, and decide to stage protests to raise awareness. Perhaps the solution to all our problems is not simply allowing [US, Japanese and European] corporations (who are constantly merging) to run amok and call the shots. What's good for business is not always what's good for people.

Get the truth: www.cato.org
Or just perhaps their point of view.

PUBLIC AWARENESS ADVISORY REGARDING "4-1-9" OR "ADVANCE FEE FRAUD" SCHEMES

And a news article: ABC News: Too Good To Be True

The Secret Service's electrionic evidence guidelines are located here. and include the following information that seems pertinent in this case:
1. * * Networked or business computers
* Consult a Computer Specialist for further assistance
* Pulling the plug could:
* Severely damage the system
* Disrupt legitimate business
* Create officer and department liability

http://www.ustreas.gov/usss/

Before people ask, "why are the US President's bodyguards involved here?"

The Secret Service are a branch of the US Department of the Treasury.

A Secret Service FAQ: The Secret Service has primary jurisdiction to investigate threats against Secret Service protectees; counterfeiting of U.S. currency or other U.S. Government obligations; forgery or theft of U.S. Treasury checks, bonds or other securities; credit card fraud; telecommunications fraud; computer fraud; identify fraud; and certain other crimes affecting federally insured financial institutions.

The bottom line in any employer-employee contract is that the employee is free to leave at any time. If he does not, then he is not being 'abused' by the company for which he works. All whining about abuse of employees etc is besides the point entirely, IMO. The simple fact is that these employees have a choice, and they have chosen to work for Microsoft.

And Microsoft has chosen to do business in the US. In so doing, they have also chosen to do business under US employment law.

You can call somebody whatever you want, but the federal employment rules recognize job descriptions over job titles. In other words, if I hire someone as an employee, then tomorrow, even though they're doing the same thing under the same conditions, say "You're a contractor, you get no benefits, suck it up and deal," that ain't gonna fly with the IRS or the Dept. of Labor.

The IRS has a list of guidelines for whether you're likely to be an employee or an independent contractor. None of them is conclusive, nor is any combination, but the more items you answer "yes" to, the greater the likelihood that you're an employee. The IRS will also be happy to make a conclusive determination for an employer if they file a form SS-8.

The basic problem here is employers creating an invalid and unfair artificial distinction between employees and "contractors" to keep their costs down. I won't claim full impartiality here, since I worked as a "contractor" in a job where I too was really an employee, but the law is very clear and it's routinely flouted. Misclassification of employees is probably the most lucrative tax violation bar none that tech companies engage in.

In any case, these are computer programmers and technical types - it's not as though they are working making footballs in the third world for tuppence happeny a day, is it? Doesn't the geek community have better things to worry about than this?

Irrelevant, and silly to boot. A buck is a buck. If I earn $50K, that doesn't make it less wrong for a mugger (or my employer) to steal $20 from me than from a shipyard joe making $20K and supporting 3 kids.

We should take a leaf out of Bill Gates book, and help the truly deprived, and not scratch our own backs here.

Let's also not get all wet and sloppy about that just yet. Note that a) he's giving away blocks of MS stock to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, stock which they liquidate, and b) he gets a big fat tax deduction on it (I guarantee you he's in the 39.6% bracket, so this is not trivial here). So Bill G. gets to look good in the press, get rid of MS stock in huge chunks without alarming Wall Street (and mask his real sells at the same time), and take a huge tax break to boot.

All of which is irrelevant to the main issue here, I just note it for the record.

More importantly, this could suddenly reverse the dominant industry trend of classifying employees-in-fact as contractors to save a couple of bucks. I made your choice, and I don't regret doing so (for other reasons as well), but it's ridiculous that Microsoft and others get away with this. It's a "loophole" that never really existed, and it looks like some big companies might finally pay the price.

You can argue that some employment law is bogus, and I'll be happy to debate that, but let's not make a screwy argument about choice to let businesses weasel out of legal duties they've accepted.

No they don't do that at all ...

...Or do they?

Conversely, until very recently if you lived in, say, Connecticut and commuted into New York City to work -- as hundreds of thousands of people do every day -- you'd pay NY State and NY City income tax and then get to deduct that from your home state income tax. Even though you rely largely on government-run services (schools, fire departments, and whatnot) in your home state.

As far as I can see, what happens with these cross-border situations is that there's always some imbalance one way or the other. Either the residents get a tax advantage from the commuters/expats at the expense of their home jurisdiction (as in the NYC case), or the home jurisdiction of the commuters/expats gets a tax advantage over the jurisdiction where they work (as in U.S. citizens working in Canada, it sounds like).

that would've been a lot better with an editor (and a lawyer :-)

it's precedent

and the issue is hardly resolved, for sure.

--

Firms A and B are working on separate commercially viable projects. But they each need something the other has coded. Plan 1. A and B market their code. They sell their code to each other. The IRS gets a chunk of each firms profit on the deal. Plan 2. A and B just swap their code for free. Its not open source, they just swap. But they don't report this barter to the irs. The irs gives them a copy of Publication 525 to read while they are in federal prison. Barter is income and is taxable, although there are usually bigger penguins to catch. Plan 3. A and B open source their code. Now they are giving away the code for free. And so they can grab each others code without earning income or creating tax consequences. If their releases are so buggy and obscure that no one else would want it, then it is effectively the same as Plan 2, without the taxes. Sounds like a tax break to me.

The tens and fives are both being released next year, and the Treasury hasn't yet decided whether they're going to redesign the one.

Treasury Unveils New $10 and $5 Bills

- Orange Julius

As the maintainer of a government web site, I can only say how much I agree. Those repeatedly posting that the web is a visual medium are just flat wrong. The web (and to a greater extent and more importantly the internet) ain't about pretty pictures or fonts only the designer of them can read. It's about ideas. It's a mechanism for communicating those ideas. And anyone who says "They're blind! Let 'em eat cake!" is not only heartless but ignorant. It is simply unacceptable for society to take a group of people who "see" the world in a different way and shut them out. Isn't that what all the Hellmouth uproar has been about? Saying "Blind people? Fuck 'em!" is the moral equivalent of saying "Plays Doom? Put 'em in isolation!" Neither condition is a good reason to cut people off from the rest of the world. And folks, I believe that the 'net has reached a level of importance, of validity, and of ubiquity that cutting people off from the online world is nearly the equivalent of shutting them out of the physical world.

I know my blind users appreciate the fact that I'm not trying to win any design contests. I'm just trying to communicate. Just like any other Any Browser proponent. :-)

As for the nuts and bolts, it's not all that hard to make sites useful to everyone. Check out the IRS web site for a look at a huge site that works in text only mode. And if you're open to making the sites you design more useful, try the basic information available from the Department of Justice page on this topic. There's even a fine page on the topic from the General Services Administration. Just because they're government sites doesn't mean they're bad.

On the flip side, of course, I think the folks filing this suit could have chosen a better place to try to make available for the blind than AOL. Suppose they get everything they ask for and AOL becomes totally accessible? What then? A whole new group of folks gets to look at the service and decide that it's crap?

:-)

Sorry. I couldn't resist the cheap shot.