In working my way through the Anxieties Canary lists in her article I get to the tenth, taxes…
Like A Storm
In America the IRS is the Internal Revenue Service. It is the taxing agency of the American government that has its own courts and law enforcement officers. It also has over 1,977 forms, 90,000+ (2015) employees, and 74,000 pages or 3.7 million words of tax law that it enforces (Reference) without regard to the Constitutional principal of Due Process. Continue reading
Psyke Phaeton has an article up on the Lab’s new request for tax information. Since Psyke lives outside the USA (Australia) and is not a US citizen he does not have to pay US taxes. But, the US government forces Linden Lab to collect a 30% tax from foreign nationals making money in the USA. If the Lab cannot get RL tax information on an individual they cannot pay them and in some cases may have to close their SL account, which Psyke says happened to him.
@ BS’s Bring a Friend & Stay Awhile – 2014 Music & Dance
Psyke made the Psyke’s Defense Systems® HomeSecurity™ Orb. You can find it in the Market Place here. The web site is here. Continue reading
The Second Life blog now has a post from the Lab regarding tax reporting issues. See: Required Tax Documentat
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) requires Linden Lab to collect and retain Form W-9 (for U.S. residents) and Form W-8BEN (for non-U.S. residents) at certain transaction volumes. If you reach the transaction threshold and we do not have your completed and signed W-9 or W-8BEN on file, we are required to withhold funds from your account (at the current rate of 28% of your gross amounts received). Additionally, for U.S. residents with 200 or more transactions with a total amount in excess of $20,000 in a calendar year, we are required to file a Form 1099-K with the IRS reporting those transactions for that year.
If you are required to submit a W-9 or W-8BEN form to us, we will email you before the end of the year with instructions on how to do so. Please follow the instructions to complete and submit the required Form W-9 or W-8BEN within thirty (30) days of receipt. You will only need to complete this paperwork once unless your information changes from year-to-year. If you do not receive an email from Linden Lab, we do not need you to complete these forms.