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RE: The 4% withdraw rule and why you may never need to completely cash out of Steemit
I really want to make clear, I agree with the fact that this is all totally new and fairly up in the air. The current paradigm doesnt make sense entirely but seems to be trying to tax new "value" upon its coming into existence.
Everyone has their own personal risk assessment to do, especially in legal frontiers like this. Mine tends to be very conservative.
the take away though is that just to say "I see no risk", period, is a very bold statement when dealing with the amounts of USD equivalent value STEEM is now producing in conjunction with the IRS's desire to tax that burgeoning value
Right but it might be technically impossible to track value to that extent with current tools. We simply have no way to determine what the value of Steem is prior to at least a bank connecting and willing to accept Steem for fiat. I mean does any bank accept Steem in exchange for fiat so we can have an idea of what Steem is worth?
Otherwise it's just a bunch of barter to barter until it gets to Bitcoin. Bitcoin actually does connect to the banking system and actually has a fiat price, because it tries to be a currency. Steem Dollars don't match up to $1 so we don't know for sure what that is really worth, and while you can trade it for Bitcoin which really does have a price, then it's Bitcoin where things are slightly more clear but not significantly better.
So basically what you are saying is that there is a potentially impossible and confusing tax burden on bloggers who use Steemit. The only solutions will be to press the IRS to clarify their position, and to change the laws to relax the tax burden so that it becomes something reasonable. As you describe it, not only would it be non-practical for Steemit users, but also for the IRS to try to enforce it. All sides would lose as the IRS would seem to have to spend more money than they could gain trying to enforce those policies, and then the individual users cannot track all that unless they are an accountant and even then it would be difficult.
If you go to a CPA it is not a guarantee that this will protect you. You are right there is risk involved (regulatory risk), but I see no way to reduce it. The situation seems to be to pay the taxes you think you owe the IRS and wait or the IRS to correct you in the future.
That's what my post was about - it really does sum up my whole position
https://steemit.com/steem/@dber/let-s-talk-about-taxes-2017613t316666z
The ultra conservative approach - meaning total protection - is to do what i plan on doing - which invovles a ledger,and always cashing out enoguh to maintain the worst case scenario tax burden for that year.