the news today once again flared up. these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. showing corporations rule the day. good afternoon welcome to capital account i'm lauren lyster here in washington d.c. these are your headlines for tuesday october twenty third two thousand and twelve in the light of the obama romney foreign policy debate today we'll talk about u.s. foreign tax policy or discuss the i.r.s. is mission creep with the daily reckonings joel bowman and january two thousand and thirteen is not just when the u.s. is set to reach that fiscal cliff we hear so much about it's also when the foreign account tax compliance act is reportedly slated to become effective now this is where uncle sam requires banks all over the world to report back to the i.r.s.

on their u.s. accountable doors looking forward could you want to citizens with precious metals overseas be the next targets of i.r.s. scrutiny we'll hear from federal tax practitioner david selig plus paul ryan shirtless is googled nine times more often then paul ryan budget that's according to new york times that. participation will those guys let's get to today's capital account. if maybe you own precious metals or want to or you like ben bernanke he think of precious metals as money there is some buzz about what the i.r.s.

is up to that you may want to be aware of this is according to our next guest now he's a federal tax practitioner and he's got some concerns about growing government attention being paid to the laws governing barter and he has analysis as to why this may matter to owners of gold and silver tax professional david selig walked me through his logic earlier starting with the barter laws on the book take a listen these are not new laws these laws have been on the books for quite some time you can look at topic for twenty or publication five twenty five that really speaks to bartering but with the vicissitudes of the economy. the internal revenue service is really looking very closely at these exchanges and i know a lot of people say a fair exchange is no robbery but for our purposes it may in fact be taxable event so for let's say legal purposes they may not look and so the

sufficiency of an exchange but for tax purposes it's becoming a very closely scrutinized to show and for our audience explain what fair exchange what you mean when you say that well that would be if let's say i traded you something that had a monetary value of one hundred dollars and you gave me something that had the value of two thousand dollars ok would be a on the even exchange now for legal purposes it may be a valid exchange but it could very well be a taxable event particularly for you receiving this item that is worth two thousand dollars now when you only had if you were to look at it as skin in the game one hundred dollars so the remaining. you know nine hundred dollars could be taxed as regular income ok and this is all we've been the case but now the i.r.s.

is starting to enforce it or go after people that are not doing this more often all this right they're certainly looking at it much more closely and it is a regular question that is coming up with frequency an audit it's an examinations because when you engage in a barter transaction you're required by law to file what's called the ten b. and if you don't do that you are running afoul of our existing tax laws now if you look at the example that i just gave you lauren where it is a disproportionate exchange and you do not report that you could even be criminally prosecuted under internal revenue code seventy two or one they could make an argument and it might be a very good argument that you were attempting to evade or defeat a tax because there's a lot of people who just don't seem to want to accept that when you exchange one item for another you may create a tax liability ok so now let's take this one step further and what does this have

to do in your view with precious metals well that's a really interesting thing you see you have people who are by collecting perhaps even hoarding gold when they are making these exchanges or let's say in the event we had a economic disaster or hyperinflation of some stripe which could be brought about by any number of reasons now that gold is something that is or silver is something of real value whereas the dollar is just backed by a promise so let's say you have an example of hyperinflation and these are just you know hypothetical figures and let's say a loaf of bread now is selling for two hundred dollars and you were to exchange. one hundred dollars worth of gold's real value for that two hundred dollar loaf of bread you will have

a taxable event of one hundred dollars and that's something that should be of great concern to people who are in this forum who are collecting these precious metals additionally when they swap in exchange they are required to file these ten ninety nine b. is. a tax practitioner my experience is a lot of people are deficient in this filing requirement because they they want to be under the radar if the government were to really ratchet up perhaps put tremendous pressure on the providers of these coins and bullion and certificates and such they perhaps could go after them very much like they're going after the foreign banking right now maybe open up a window for a limited immunity so people will now turn themselves in voluntary disclosure program and then after that it's i imagine it would fall like dominoes ok so a couple things i want to get into is that first do you see any evidence that the i.r.s.

is looking into this at all what you're describing with precious metals and and now thought of going after it in the same way that they've gone after foreign banks do you see any evidence yet or this is an idea of what could be down the pipeline if a number of things happen well there certainly is a degree of conjecture to what i'm saying however there is a recent case where an individual who was involved in some unrelated tax crimes was forced in fact to sell approximately eighty thousand dollars worth of gold coins and immediately tender that money over to the service it also triggered a significant taxable event just because he paid the government this money did not mean he was got any sort of tax abatement so let's say he purchased this gold hypothetically again at three hundred dollars an ounce and. it is appreciated too you know over two thousand dollars an ounce he had to pay taxes on the difference

that case just played out only a few months ago ok so now if you follow the tax law that when you when you file all the paperwork that you're supposed to do in regards to anything that you're doing with your precious metals everything is fine right this is just for people that are evading that you know that's very true but it also raises some very grey area questions for instance a lot of people keep their precious metals abroad and the law is not entirely clear on disclosure of what you have and what you don't have and obviously many people wish to remain anonymous the way it used to be with swiss banks and such and now we see that these banks are cooperating with the federal government and people who are not turning themselves in are subject to some very very heavy handed penalties and this is something that i think is most certainly on the radar and that we're going to see coming in the next coming months and in the you know

the immediate future this is very interesting and then also one step further why do you see anything that would indicate any kind of reason to believe there would ever be confiscation by the government of precious metals as we saw in one nine hundred thirty three when the government confiscated most of everybody's gold well it also happened in one thousand and seventeen and we do have good legal precedence for it let me pause a scenario and medically this too is conjecture but it's not outside of the ambit of possibility let's say we were to have a catastrophe that eclipsed could trina whether it be say a detonation of a dirty bomb or a nuclear event or a crop failure or a sudden and terrible loss of fifty percent of a. oil and all of a sudden now the dollar really has no value you can walk with a handful of dollars into

a store and no one wants to trade well the government needs to shore up support in that and they can't have a competing currency for instance silver or gold or something with a real value. undermining their interests when such an event like that happens and there's two provisions both for during the war and one for non-war purposes the government certainly could and has done before take your private possession make it their own that whether or not you're compensated for it or how much you're compensated for it remains to be seen but i don't think it's unrealistic additionally lauren you have several supreme court justices right now who are on the record as saying they will look and consider and weigh far and wall when crafting their decisions you know in australia they had a law on the books until nine hundred seventy seven saying they could take

physically take your gold and give you their paper dollars in exchange whether you wanted to accept it or not and they only suspended that law they never abolished it they never repealed it so i don't think it's an unrealistic event that could happen ok and just real quickly before we go short of a hyper inflationary scenario where people are trying to do actual business with gold and use that as money short of a scenario where the government is going to confiscate precious metals because there's a disaster do you think there are concerns is what i'm hearing that people that own gold actually need to be considering about in terms of the way that the i.r.s. is looking at maybe increasingly changing the way that it wants people to deal with and report their gold holdings i do and i think it is falling under closer scrutiny . on a regular and daily basis and i would imagine that these pan gender i'm sore involved in raising the maximum amount of taxes proffered or whatever you want to call it

for the government we're looking at this as one of the sweetest plums of all there you have it that was david selig federal tax practitioner for selling and associates and still ahead we'll talk to joel bowman about the war on whistleblowers but today what focus on a whistleblower was actually in the government's good graces and why the i.r.s. is involved but first you're closing market numbers.

with. science technology innovation all the moves developments around russia we've got this huge you're covered. the war.

welcome back sticking to taxes that the foreign account tax compliance act is slated to go into effect in a few months now why well an aide to senator max baucus the senate finance committee chairman who sponsored the two thousand and bill was quoted in the wall street journal saying foreign tax evasion is a drain on the federal budget worth tens of billions of dollars and it puts an

unfair burden on law abiding american taxpayers to fill that gap however that arguably puts an unfair burden on banks all over the world who've had to cough major money for compliance forms reports it could cost financial institutions one hundred million dollars in compliance and as the wall street journal reports banks risk a penalty equivalent to thirty percent of a bank's u.s. income if just one person is over looked into of course the smaller the bank the harder it's hit now the unintended consequence is now many foreign banks don't want to deal with u.s. citizens at all and according to reports ex-pats are unable to open accounts or they're getting letters in the mail saying their accounts have been closed and they're increasingly going as far as to settle their tax bill with uncle sam once and for all and renounce their u.s. citizenship and while some have meanwhile accuse the obama administration of

engaging in a war on whistleblowers on the contrary being a whistleblower for the i.r.s. appears to pay off quite handsomely in this whistleblower dynamic is something i spoke about recently with daily reckoning managing editor jill bowman take a look of course famous example that many people cover and talk about as bradley manning who exposed a military c. . then he was awarded with solitary confinement however you have another was a blower that you write about this happened about a month ago we had bradley burke and feld who wow he was a whistleblower and he was awarded one hundred million dollars the difference is that he gave the government information that helped them find the information of more than four thousand americans with swiss basic counts at u.b.s. so why do you think there is a lesson from these two stories and what do you think that lesson is. well that there was great fun in. this how to bradley's and as far as whistleblowers was one

of those convenient sort of moments that describe really work what the true feeling of the state of the government whether it's obama or romney or whoever is currently occupying that. town of richard c. in the belly of the beast into the sea. it's that it was one of those examples that just said hey this is clearly whose side we're on so as you mention when one individual comes to the aid of the state. to the detriment of the private information of product lines private citizens are going about their business then you know always on this guy's water with one hundred million dollars plus check i mean this is this is obscene. at the same time when you know somebody comes out in opposition to the government and remember this is the case of credit for the man it wasn't a case of. a military soldier divulging

information to the iraqi population or to the afghan population i mean these or individuals know what's going on every day because it's you know they're going up at the sky wondering if they're going to be the next. what they're what he was really doing was disclosing information about the state to the american people. who are whether or not they voted for paying for this enormous military. expansion of military budget which is now seeing the united states occupy military bases in one hundred seventy countries around the world. and this is that this was just one of those it's a tile in a much much larger mosaic of misery and destruction that the state is. subjecting individuals to not just in the u.s. but all over the world yeah and with bradley bergenfield with that bradley this

wasn't just helping this day this wasn't just a you this is the i r s two which is an agency that i've seen really expand its reach around the globe i mean international banks have been upset with new regulations to put it very lightly i'm wondering if you think that the i.r.s. as expansion and its expanded reach has more to do with the fact that the government's broke and that the i.r.s. need to collect money or how much it has to do with a more general expansion and more general mission creep that has happened more broadly with the government whether we're talking about undeclared wars or spying on citizens be a patriot act that just gets reinstated without much of a discussion by lawmakers. that's a good point you know i think it's probably a little of both but you know the i.r.s. is one of the one of the finalists probably along with the tears. in the.

well it's one of the violence but it's a good competition for worst agency state but there is probably something to do with the vast an uncontrollable experience of. this state's. sixteen plus really done as you mentioned but i think this is. you know this is kind of the strategy that we. see with boxes when they're kind of been they're going to be knocked around a little bit they're kind of getting desperate people are starting to realize that the g. eight is up. you know this study to realize hey i don't think that we are as free as that you know as we're told that we are. and when i start looking for some. you know. so there's a model alternatives that don't involve a republican or a or a democratic super hero ok so i think the state is in sort of what we're going to see is a loss clutches and we're going to see. you know as

a as far as to fault send and trying to actual crisis upcoming i think we're going to see this brought it to much much higher relief ok and real quickly before we go you measure the t.s.a. so i just have to ask you're in argentina you have a great story i'm told what can argentinians teams. americans who just go like sheep to the slaughter through those t.s.a. body scanners. well if you know what to say you don't want to be making any sudden movements. in the in and lines in airports in the united states but yet there i did have a friend to e-mail me a little anecdote which i thought was rather amusing recently he was on his way from new zealand coming in through the customs here it is a sample i'm going to say descent it's you know this is this is kind of typical of the way that the public affairs are conducted down here where the customs officials

were were drastically undermanned you know continues another state that is that is broken and will soon be realized to such so they didn't have the manpower to be able to you know to me in all the scanners and after a few seven four seventh's flew in and learned scope was a fairly low. then when i was a process these people you know. quickly. five hundred times since basically storm to get. rid of. this i mean this is something that you would absolutely not see in the united states. but it's one of those things we're. going to eventually do you can't if the chinese decide to you know it's kind of the you know the american credit card if countries around the world are internet credit it's to the united states start realizing the very dire financial situation of the united states government it's in. you know just don't

show up for that next going to action and you know you're going to see very very drastic cuts to public services in the united states and then if as job i'm in says u.s. government spending really has to be cut then maybe we'll see those argentine style lines at the t.s.a. i was joel bowman managing editor for the daily reckoning. all right let's wrap up with loose change dimitri kofi how many times you think you've been google dimitri cuffing us shirtless. i hope many talk about. well boy have i got

a story for you because this really shows where america's priorities are these days a presidential candidate paul ryan has been one of the top trending stories on google but it is not because of politics. people googling to paul ryan the new york times campaign blog says the term paul ryan shirtless is google that nine times more often than paul ryan budget. how is that for caring about the nation's finances in the grand plans in order to balance the budget but also i mean what's really special this happened when obama was president to that show the pictures from hawaii yeah they want to see that and like i don't really get it was the big deal about paul ryan's body i know this isn't the this isn't the thing that we're going for here but that just shows how much people don't care about the budget that paul ryan shirtless is that much more scintillating and you contend that i mean when he's like obviously not you know margaret. it says

a lot about what you like or cares about you like that i've noticed since i've moved. from the lee hollywood for unattractive otherwise qualified human beings who are people who don't deserve to have the spotlight shining on them get plenty of it and like all these people who are looking for media coverage or exposure or get in the paper or press coverage like paul ryan like. well who's you can use like brad pitt like lifting weights as you think is like arnold schwarzenegger's and that is what the real you know this is like ok what is on vacation. is. a lifting for time magazine what was the draw the line. thing is that it wasn't however i do want to point out that there are other options that don't often get covered however there is a third party candidate debate that our t. is broadcasting tomorrow an hour tonight i believe and i just thought it was quite interesting to look at some of the third party candidates they say about what they

would do for the budget and looking at project vote smart political courage tests for all of these candidates for the justice party the green party the libertarian party the constitution party one thing i notice they all have in common do you support reducing defense spending to balance the budget all yes i guess that's why that will always see these be their party candidates because that doesn't is i'm going to going to work on the answer to. but are you going are you going to see what they look at with their shirt off. that isn't important you're just going with the shirt off i'd like to know that you know like someone i'm interested maybe if there was a public interest in that we would see more headway made in the mainstream by these third party candidates specially should be doing so that's the thing that's a big mistake you're johnson has done he hasn't actually he should too should streak make it across the white house want there you go you want to get press coverage america then that is your best oh yeah that's the that's what is going wrong you should be running around waiting for the capitol building goes straight

and then you'll be invited to participate in the presidential nomination i feel right we'll leave it there for now because that's all we have time for thank you so much for watching and be sure to come back tomorrow and in the meantime you know you can follow me on twitter at lauren lyster you can like our facebook page it's right there give us feedback catch any shows you misstate you tube dot com slash capital account all respond on friday plus you can see it's an h d on hulu and from everyone here thank you so much for watching and have a great night. cretaceous free. for charges free. range free. three stooges free. download free blog videos for your media project free media gondar t.v.

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