Financial Surveillance

The Democrats seek to impose further reporting requirements on banks, including on quite small accounts, in order to help the IRS catch tax evaders. This follows in the footsteps of the FATCA law, which demanded that foreign banks serving Americans abroad provide financial reports, and resulted in Americans having their accounts terminated, and finding it difficult to obtain banking services; there was an increase in Americans renouncing their citizenship. The new reporting requirements would infringe on people’s privacy, and impose costs on financial institutions, which would be passed on, one way or another.

One reason to support land value taxation is that, because land is visible, assessing and taxing it does not require this kind of prying. Unfortunately, today’s advocates of soaking the rich (and incidentally the non-rich) are mostly not aware of LVT as an alternative way of shifting the tax burden to the privileged.

Kickstarter for Jo Walton’s Lifelode

There is a Kickstarter seeking money to pay for an audio version of Jo Walton’s novel Lifelode. The last time I checked the webpage, it was still several thousand dollars short, and set to expire on October 20. If you’re interested, and have some money to chip in, now’s the time.

If you’re not familiar with Kickstarter, someone can use it to raise money for a project, and you can pledge money with your credit card. If people don’t pledge enough to put the project into action, you aren’t charged anything; if enough is pledged, then your card is charged, and in due course, you get your reward, which might be an audiobook, or, if you pledge more, an audiobook and extra goodies.

I enjoyed the novel, which the estimable Jo Walton wrote some years back, and I would be happy to see an audiobook produced, so I pledged a little money, and I’m boosting the signal.