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The People of Ohio Can Now Pay Their Taxes in Bitcoin (qz.com)
Starting this week, businesses in Ohio will be able to pay taxes in bitcoin through a new platform, OhioCrypto.com, a first in the US. From a report: For many enthusiasts, part of the appeal of crypto has been the very fact that these currencies are not backed by governments. That makes it harder for politicians to manipulate currencies to their own ends, they say. But for the same reason, states have sought to sideline cryptocurrencies, comfortable to dismiss bitcoin as a passing fad. So Ohio, and its treasurer Josh Mandel, see embracing them as a way to signal that the state is tech-savvy and forward-thinking. "I do see [bitcoin] as a legitimate form of currency," Mandel told (paywall) the Wall Street Journal.
They better be cashing out the picosecond those BT transactions go through...
A lot of places that embraced bitcoin quickly are already discontinuing it or not supporting it anymore.
Are you the guy that spams every thread trying to market some product? If so, you deserve to be censored.
... treasurer Josh Mandel
Man was that easy.
I seriously cannot comprehend how mind-bogglingly stupid [some/most] politicians can be. How do these people even function in society?
This is almost certainly going to be ruinous for Ohio's bottom line. I highly doubt anyone associated with the Ohio treasury is as involved and up to speed on crypto transactions as they would need to be to avoid such a volatile currency blowing up in their faces.
This is just another attempt to make the public think "Bitcoin is ok; there is nothing to worry!"
(Thanx to Bitcoin shill(s) successfully infiltrated Ohio government!)
Bitcoin & all its offspring (alt-coins) are DYING!
Lying to yourself (& pretending everything is ok) will not change the reality!
So, to all bitcoin/cryptocurrency HODLers:
Sell ASAP!!!
(Unless you want to end up w/ zero money in the end!!!)
For many enthusiasts, part of the appeal of crypto has been the very fact that these currencies are not backed by governments. That makes it harder for politicians to manipulate currencies to their own ends, they say.
Who needs the government to manipulate your currency when speculators already do so with tumultuous and unpredictable swings in value every day?
Monopoly money! Pyramid Scheme! Monopoly Money!
If you say the mantras enough times, you'll go into a nice trance state and the next story will be ready soon after.
There's certainly stupid beliefs on both sides. The orthodox crypto-nerds think crypto-currency is just around the corner from replacing traditional currency. The Slashdot crown all thinks it's pure smoke and mirrors. The reality is somewhere between those two extremes.
So far the killer-app of crypto currency is selling drugs over the internet, and capital flight. I don't really count "nutty speculation" as much of a killer app.
You don't have to like the above two functions, but you should admit they're usages of crypto-currency that actually exist, and likely will never go away.
Ohio bankrupt after BitCoin collapse.
Federal government launches investigation.
Trump tweets; 'What the actual fuck?'
I thought the appeal behind bitcoin was supposed to be it's anonymous (really pseudonymous). I thought gold was supposed to be the "I don't trust fiat currency" asset.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
I get where you are coming from, what with the volatility of bitcoin, but I suspect being able to tie an individual bitcoin wallet with an individual tax payer more than makes up for any shortfalls as a result of delaying cashing out.
Oh sure, one could have multiple wallets and could make sure to not directly transfer anything between the two, but how many people are really going to bother taking those steps?
They are not taking bitcoin, they are taking USD. Some pay provider converts the coin to USD and hands them over. This would be like saying you can pay with beanie babies if the same provider would take them as payment.
Michigan agrees to accept Beanie Babies as tax payments. Colorado agrees to accept Magic Trading Cards. And in a surprise move, California will accept any baseball card printed prior to 1965.
I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
Wallets are free, criminals already do this with cell phones and ID's and coin wallet thefts, so that's probably exactly who. And given that addition to the volatility... Gov's could lose a lot of money real fast. Taxpayer money. That'd be bad.
It means I can pay taxes without having to use the US banks. The US banking system is horrible at the best of times. If you happen to be black or live in an undesirable part of the USA it is out right abusive. Crypto currencies don't make a lot of sense in most countries but in Venezuela, Zimbabwe or the USA they do. So thank you Ohio.
"So Ohio, and its treasurer Josh Mandel, see embracing them as a way to signal that the state is tech-savvy and forward-thinking."
Like Orange County California, I bet
https://www.investopedia.com/a...
Just like Robert Citron, Josh is playing with other people's money. He should get smacked down fast.
This story is getting a lot of hype from the BTC evangelists. Of course, the truth is that Ohio is only accepting dollars for taxes. The Ohio treasury is using BitPay to convert BTC immediately into dollars, minus whatever fees are charged for the conversion. Unless you've already had BTC in your possession prior to 2017, what's the point?
The question that BTC evangelists hope you won't ask next is "Who else is still accepting Bitcoin for payments?" Here's a list of companies as tallied last month: https://unblock.net/companies-...
You might recognize maybe half a dozen names from that list. As a means of conducting day-to-day retail transactions, BTC has dropped off the map. It is rarely even mentioned anymore.
It might not be as stupid as you think. You see when you use the bitcoin to pay your taxes which are denominated in dollars you will trigger a capital gains tax. So next year they will know exactly how many bitcoin you "sold" to pay this year's taxes and if you do not have a capital gains entry for those coins then they know exactly whom to audit!
How do they know your basis?
Are independent transactions linked? Serial transactions? What if you sell some bitcoin today, buy some tomorrow and use that to pay your taxes?
Wouldn't that obscure any so-called capital gains?
Also, if US currency was deflationary would the government be allowed to collect capital gains taxes on your bank account? Bitcoin is (nominally) a currency, so do capital gains actually apply to changes in its value?
Is there some way to short the economy of Ohio? I've got the inside track that their treasurer may be an unstable lunatic.
Wallets are free, criminals already do this with cell phones and ID's and coin wallet thefts, so that's probably exactly who.
I didn't ask who would do that, I asked how many would do that. Sure, some people will do that, but I suspect enough people won't bother such that government will still come out ahead even with bitcoin volatility, from going after people for not reporting all of the money they made trading bitcoin.
States can't make any thing other than gold or silver coin a tender in payment of debts. The legal dodge is that the states aren't the Fed or the Treasury, so it isn't they that are making the requirement of transacting in fiat Federal Reserve Note dollars, so the constitutional restriction does not apply. This dodge fails if a state decides to accept something else as a tax debt payment.
Arguably a necessary characteristic of money is being able to pay your taxes in it, for instance the success of Worgl stampscript (negative interest currency) experiment of the '30s came largely from the local government accepting it as tax payment. The local government also issued it, which gave them the reason to accept it. The negative-interest aspect (had to buy stamps to affix to keep a currency note current) led to a huge increase in the velocity of money as people wished to avoid paying the stamps, and also a huge move toward long-term investment as negative interest rates turned the present-value calculation upside down, making money worth more the further in the future it would be taken out, rather than future returns being discounted.
"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?" - Patrick Henry
The alt-right pitches bitcoin, many of them hate the government and the fed, same with the crazier libertarians.
I haven't lived in Ohio for decades, but I suspect the folks that are doing this are fans of the alt-right twitter trolls and websites.
I believe bitcoin is down today.
I think they've discussed this in other states as well.
Ooopsy, only a year late to the party :)
Just close your web browser. Delete /. from your bookmarks. Use some other community where everybody loves you. How fucking hard is it to work that out?
If there's any practical gap between the nominal value and the cash liquidity of Bitcoin, Ohio had better brace itself for a stampede of Bitcoin payments.
If there's any practical gap, this might be a cynical move on the part of some wealthy Ohio speculator with political connections.
Most likely this is some person who scored a Bitcoin windfall and now wishes to return to an actual cash position at face value, who increasingly anticipates a Bitcoin implosion any day now.
Let say I earned $100k this year. How much do I owe in BTC? Can I play the volatility at my advantage?
gweihir KNEW u IMPERSONATE me https://it.slashdot.org/commen... c6gunner proves it https://linux.slashdot.org/com... & forgot to SUBMIT AC & used his registered 'lusrname' (he tried to mock me both BEFORE & after I FAIRLY challenged him to show he's done better work - he had ZERO).
I'd never "cry victim" to ne'er-do-wells (TROLLS, not all /.ers) either.
U EVEN HELPED ME https://science.slashdot.org/c... (& then realizing it you quit trying to make me look bad via what you thought were lies on hosts as "ME" IN YOUR IMPERSONATIONS of me e.g. https://tech.slashdot.org/comm... on speculative execution attack: Hosts PREVENT 'EM, joke's on you)
APK
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The US Tax payer needs to be on the hook to bailout bitcoin one way or another. Only then will America be great again! #MAGA
Football...Ohio should just stick to kicking Michigan's *** in football every year. That's basically their only remaining industry at this point. That and opiod treatment centers.
I will be paying in Dogecoin.
Except the theft = scalable, not tending to be limited to per-person or per-diem or any limitation like that. Accepting BT != catching all BT related tax fraud, that's an entirely different concept. I don't know how you confuse them.
I'm pretty sure they did it solely to shut up that guy who always posts that "Bitcoin isn't a real currency because you can't pay your taxes with it". ;^)
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
They are hoping their tax revenue will sextuple when Bitcoin goes to new highs.
Are those criminals paying taxes?
If they aren't they are completely irrelevant to the case.
Not ready for cryptocurrency. Or any science at all.