Jen Psaki tells Peter Doocy that rich people can be held accountable too

Originally published at: Jen Psaki tells Peter Doocy that rich people can be held accountable too | Boing Boing

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Hrrm… but some of the proposed changes do not feel like they are going after “high net worth individuals”. I am not sure about this $10,000 in the bank proposal - that’s new to me. But the $600 transaction proposal sounds a lot more like they are going after side hustles or people that flip buying collectables or antiques or something.

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Is this a show? It’s like we are being taught how to argue with each other, not really resolving anything, but to argue about something else again tomorrow.

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$10K a year in non-W2 income would hit most freelancers. That’s waaay too low a threshold. If they excluded all 1099’d workers as well, it might fit their stated goal better. But in general, me no like. And I do already pay all required taxes.

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Canadian here, so 65 mg of salt , but I think this is the 600$ proposal amended to 10,000$. This sort of thing kind of gives me the willies, though. The “you don’t need cash” movement, etc. How long before every banknote has tracking facility? Certainly feasible now, each note could have unique scanable figure on it, seems like a little too much oversight. (I know that’s a straw man argument right now, but I’m just sayin’ :slight_smile: )

Every time I see a clip of Pete Deucey I’m left with the impression that he’s a half-baked Tim Heidecker character.

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It’s a messaging war. The battle will continue unabated.

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I’m thinking the same thing. This will have a bigger impact on people who make their money selling lots of stuff on Craigslist and flea markets rather than the billionaires. But, to be fair, those people should be paying taxes on that income anyway.

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I haven’t read the proposal, but what it sounds like is that Biden wants treasury and the IRS to share information to see if people are underreporting their income. Treasury is already collecting the bank info as part of the anti-terror, anti-narcotrafficking, anti-money-laundering laws they have to enforce, and sharing this info with the IRS would give the IRS a tool to find people who are underreporting (and under paying) their income and taxes. I’m sure the idea is to find big fish who claim to only have a million in taxable revenue, but whose banks show transactions multiple times that amount, and therefore are a potential tax cheat and a good target for an audit.

If a freelancer earns $100K in a year but only reports $50K, they’ll possibly (probably) get caught, but they are small fish compared to the ultra rich (and probably companies) who wouldn’t even notice if they paid their full tax obligation, but still try to cheat anyway.

No surprise that Fox’s lords are freaking out about this prospect. US tax law requires that taxpayers keep their tax records for 3 years, unless they are committing tax fraud, in which case they are supposed to keep the records forever.

I am not opposed to this on principle, but am in practice. We all know the Sacklers and Waltons won’t pay any more in taxes under this proposal, but regular folk busting their asses to make ends meet, and taking a couple off-the-books side jobs are the ones who are going to suffer.

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That explanation from Psaki before getting into the fact that moron nepotism poster child Doocy (like most of his mouth-breathing fans) doesn’t understand what cash flow is ($10k in cash flow != $10k in a bank account).

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While I don’t disagree, I’ll point out that currently the IRS focuses more audits and such on low to moderate income earners because they tend to pay up rather then lawyer up while the rich tend to bring a bunch of lawyers and making it a whole big pile of work (and cost).

Do you think that is it, or is it worse, Doocy knows but figures his viewers do not?

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I’m going to with stupidity over malice in this case. Doocy is by all accounts a dumb guy who only got this plum job because his dad is a longtime Faux employee. The producer who wrote the question for him might have known, but counted on Doocy not knowing.

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Rare backstage image of Doocy being prepared for his next attempt:
image

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I would hope it’d be more to suss individuals trying to launder larger amounts of money by making multiple “small” transactions of $10,000, rather than people struggling to survive. In other news, FBI is searching the h̶o̶m̶e̶s̶ mansions of Putin, Manafort and McConnell friend Oleg Deripaska, for undisclosed reasons. FBI Agents Raid Homes Of Russian Oligarch Oleg Deripaska | Crooks and Liars
The principle of “follow the money” may be pointing them at big fish as opposed to people struggling to survive on Etsy.

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Treasury already does that. Every bank that wants to do business in the US is supposed to report transactions originating from the US of $10K+, vet the recipient through OFAC prior to releasing funds to the recipient/intermediary bank, and follow up with the client if the transaction is unusual. Most of the process is automated unless an alarm is triggered.

It’s one of the reasons real estate is a favored way to launder money: you have a mortgage that justifies the transfer of funds, which clears the lowest level of scrutiny. Most banks don’t ask whether you can actually afford a mortgage they don’t originate or service, just whether your transfer has a legitimate purpose.

I love the way Doocy seemed completely bored by the answer. It was like he didn’t really want an answer.

I’m waiting for the day he asks the all important question: “Does the Biden administration know who’s on first?”

If you do the math on what the pool of taxable income is, split by total income (i.e. X number of people times the Y median of the income bracket) you will find that this is not an unattractive proposition.

But realistically - the biggest pool of untaxed income (IIRC) is people making between 100k
and 160k single or jointly. Second biggest (also IIRC) is people making over 500k yearly. People making over a million year comprise a still significant pool of taxable income, but not as much as you’d expect. All comes down to the number of people in that tax bracket. Fairly recent data (2018 when I did it) is available, so don’t take my word for it.

I am sure this proposal would not have been put on the docket without running the numbers as to who it is targeting. It doesn’t feel like they are targeting side hustles, although that might be a nasty side effect.

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