Topic: Why Bitcoin is ultimately doomed to fail (not today or tomorrow) - page 27. (Read 40866 times)

Well what if his landlord accepts the btc directly and also never reports his income. The transaction would never be recorded. (Of course the same with case ) Theres a reason those chinese restaurants like cash (and its not just because of the lack of credit card fees).

I don't understand what that has to do with my statement? How is it the IRS knows, an audit? I never turn bitcoin into USD, how would they audit my bitcoins?

Yeah, I remember Al Capone, then the public enemy number one, was indicted for income tax evasion and sentenced to 11 years of imprisonment. He didn't get away with it!

What would happen if you tried to tell them the truth, that you mined the coins yourself and then sold them paying taxes only for the real profit you made? Would they take you to court if they don't believe you? Any real life evidence or things have yet to happen somewhere in the future (given the number of new millionaires)?

That's what Gresham's Law is about. You run away from a bad money (dollars) into a good money (bitcoins). If you are paid in dollars, you would then try to get rid of them as soon as possible, either through exchange for things or for bitcoins. So with that knowledge in your head you are first of all spending all your dollars...

I'm not very familiar with the US tax system, lol... It is pretty clear with buying and selling bitcoins, but what about bitcoins that you mined yourself and then sold them through an exchange? Should you calculate the profit or can get away with taxes by claiming a net loss? Will they ever come after you?

I also accept cocaine cover bills for payment. In fact, if there is a lot of blow on it I prefer them.

in that case you also should not accept dollars, you know almost every dollar has cocaine traces on them? sometimes even enough to cause police dogs to smell it.

now, how many times had the IRS contacted you for having cocaine in your wallet?

I don't think they will make out of the internet ... Only we will use BitCoin nothing major wont happen.

Despite what you say, they weren't able to do anything to Edward Snowden, so I think it is not too late yet. Though I agree that anonymity of Bitcoin is a myth. Was trying to explain this to one of the converts here, but to no avail...

I will accept them. I'll just spend them when I'm living in another country. All the IRS can do now is drive bitcoins out of the country. That is no benefit to them.

If they don't know your wallet, the information about someone down the chain won't help them. If they do, then they won't need this information either. To track all transactions with that wallet would be enough to corner you, unless you're a miner. So it is all six of one and half a dozen of the other...

Noone thinks that bitcoin will fail. The only ones that do so is those that are thinking bitcoins as something that opposes the dollar and that's wrong anyway.

You guys don't think.

Someone down the line of the coin's history won't be anonymous, then they are culpable for all activities on the coin unless they can provide the identities of whom they bought from and sold to. This will cascade right back to you the miner.

Once the IRS starts attacking, no one will accept or sell coins without knowing the identity of the counter-party.

The government is sitting back letting the wildwest go on so as to let electronic money become popular. Then they will crack their whip and it will done. There will be no difference between Bitcoin and 666. Everything is on the public ledger. Much worse than cash.

I don't think that Bitcoin will fail as much as people think. The reason the dollar bill has been so strong is because we were forced to accept it as currency. We had no choice in the matter. Same as all other currencies that use paper.

The dollar is supposedly backed by gold, hence it's value. However, The gold is in one place controlled by one entity.
Bitcoin is not centralized. therefore the mention of paper currency for bitcoin is moot. You would have to gather all the bitcoins into one place, thereby centralizing it, which is the exact thing it was made to do against.

The problem with bitcoins is very simple, they can be lost without any hope for recovery. Therefore, alt currencies will help fill the gap. Kind of like, We have dollar bills, but we can also have Euros, or Drupals, etc. Other currencies besides the ones we rely on.

That's my 2 satoshis

Yeah, I doubt they have people who know how to track coins. And if you mined then sold bitcoin face-to-face, the IRS wouldn't know. Not sure about coinbase, but if they are compliant they will report ?some/all? sales for $USD. If you think about it, when you cash out for USD and the exchange deposits in your bank account or writes you a check, that is a business record that is linked to you.

Thank you, it's interesting you said that because we were coming at it from opposed views on Gresham's Law (although your response gave me pause, like  that awkward moment when you realize "I've got it backwards again" kind of pause)

Don't get me wrong, anybody who knows me or followed my writings on bitcoin on wealth.net knows I'm a huge advocate of crypto-currencies, I think they are a true game-changer in terms of re-asserting liberty and free-market principles into an increasingly centrally planned economy.

In that sense, I'm a Believer.

But you also have to look at what's actually happening, and being a businessman who accepts bitcoin in a non-bitcoin business (meaning I'm not an exchange, I'm not selling mining rigs, etc) you get a certain vantage point on the market - how are the participants actually voting?

It's been quite interesting to watch. My biggest surprise was how many of my existing customers were already involved in bitcoin and using it to pay vs how many new customers came in because of bitcoin. Back in 2003-2004 when we were accepting e-gold, it was 0% former, 100% latter (I saw the problems inherent with e-gold and made it a point to out-exchange into physical coins as fast as it came in).

With bitcoin, it started out as nearly 80% former, 20% the latter and has only lately begun to reverse trend (only in the sense that word is getting out that we accept bitcoin, bringing in new customers who want to use it to pay)

Absolutely not! I also sold some portion of my coins yesterday (just in time, not at the very top but close to it). So currently I don't care where the price will go, though I think we've topped already, at least for the nearest future...

By the way, your feedback on BTC transactions was one of the most valuable in the thread

I think it is so everywhere throughout the world, but could they really trace you down, and what about the case when you mined bitcoins yourself (paid for electricity and bore other costs)? I'm not now talking about Silk Road and all that underground shit, but if you sold your coins at Coinbase, how would they even know in the first place?

If you had a time machine which would allow you to travel to the future (say, two-three years ahead of now) and saw the Bitcoins were universally accepted and dollar banned (Bitcoin addicts' pipe dream), would you spend your coins instead of dollars in the present?