this post was submitted on 24 Sep 2023
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If you resold Taylor Swift Eras Tour tickets, the IRS is watching — A new rule from the IRS is punishing those who resold tickets for more than $600 in profit with a tax penalty::A new rule from the IRS is punishing those who resold tickets for more than $600 in profit with a tax penalty.

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[–] Holyhandgrenade 121 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Somehow I doubt this will affect Ticketmaster, the biggest scalper of all

[–] jcit878 50 points 1 year ago (1 children)

er, by default any profit is taxable for them while as a lemming you get a tax free $600 profit before it impacts you

but fuck ticketmaster anyway

[–] [email protected] 38 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm pretty sure they pay effectively zero tax because they found some interesting ways to make their profit appear 0 on paper.

[–] eek2121 14 points 1 year ago

I own a business and can agree with this statement.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

I don’t understand what your point is. Of course this doesn’t impact Ticketmaster. They already pay taxes on income generated from selling tickets, so nothing changes. I can’t tell if you’re just saying dumb shit to get upvotes from other idiots or truly don’t have a clue.

[–] [email protected] 85 points 1 year ago

Fuck scalpers

[–] Cyberflunk 66 points 1 year ago (4 children)

But fuck fixing taxes to make billionaires and churches pay taxes.. eat the people as they say.

[–] hansl 111 points 1 year ago (3 children)

If you resell tickets for 600$ in profit, you’re not “the people”, you’re a scalper and I have no sympathy for you. This is a good rule.

[–] surewhynotlem 27 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's just capitalists capitalizing. The IRS just wants a cut, not to stop it.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

IRS isn't in the business of stopping transactions (unless it's money laundering) anyway

[–] LukeMedia 26 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Agreed. Obviously, the tax code should be better enforced against wealthy people, but you can support one action without it meaning you don't support another.

[–] SARGEx117 9 points 1 year ago

And as long as they ACTUALLY do both, then it doesn't matter.

But they don't.

So it does.

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

On the other hand, if it's worth your time to scalp tickets then you aren't part of the upper class.

Edit: but I do agree, fuck scalpers

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[–] solstice 5 points 1 year ago

All that happened here is they lowered the reporting threshold to cast a wider net and force people to reported income they otherwise could have just not mentioned. It's not quite like flipping a switch but it's relatively easy to comply with, and relatively easy to enforce. "Fixing taxes" is significantly more complicated, to say the least.

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[–] x4740N 56 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (7 children)

The IRS doesn't care if you do crime or are exploitative or are morally bad

They just want their cut

Edit: grammar

[–] hansl 9 points 1 year ago

The IRS will report a crime if they suspect one, but they don’t make the laws. You’re barking off the wrong tree if you think they should be the moral authority.

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[–] [email protected] 44 points 1 year ago (4 children)

let's make the threshold $60 instead of $600

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

Do you even know what the IRS is doing here? If an individual makes more than 600 in profit on anything they have to report it and pay taxes. If you lower that to 60 that would just be incredibly annoying for the majority of people to deal with on a daily basis

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

$6

anything more than the gas to deliver a ticket is a scam

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[–] RoseRose56 40 points 1 year ago (1 children)

people who resold tickets bad, ticketmaster who fixes prices good! win-win situation ?

[–] Reddfugee42 11 points 1 year ago

Law enforcement exists to protect the status quo. Corporation profit good. Individual profit bad.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 year ago (3 children)

maybe they could go after ticketmaster's near monopoly and constant breakage of agreements with gov. branches? just a thought

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[–] iforgotmyinstance 26 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Scalpers are predators, and captive markets like Ticketmaster give them a hunting ground.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (15 children)

Wait, someone paid more than $600 for a fucking concert?

[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 year ago

Yes and often times way more than that. I checked prices for a Tool concert at a venue near me a few weeks ago and the section closest to the stage had tickets reselling for thousands of dollars. Obligatory fuck Ticketmaster...

[–] Guest_User 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

They could have sold multiple tickets

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

Ah good point, that makes more sense.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Well as per article yes, but 600$ is the reporting limit. If Ticketmaster, stubhub and so on has a reseller account with sales income of more than 600$ per year, they have to file it to IRS. Whether its single sale or thousands of separate small sales doesn't matter.

Completely normal tax procedure. Pretty much all big such platforms of various fields stock exchanges, commodity markets etc. have such obligation ledges on them for avoidance of tax evasion.

Nor as second note is anyone being "punished". Punishing is what happens on breaking law. This is business taxes, you make profits selling stuff, income taxes start applying. Normal cost of doing business in society for the services society provides (national military keeps the Mongol horde from wrecking your business and so on, transport atluthority builds roads to run business trucks on so the music tour entourage can get to the arena, so one can sell tickets to that conce for profit and son on).

[–] solstice 7 points 1 year ago

Yeah this is completely normal and not at all anything to flip out about. Honestly I'm surprised the reporting threshold was ever $20k to begin with. The 1099 reporting threshold for contractors has been $600 for over a decade now so I would've assumed the same for scalpers.

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[–] irotsoma 9 points 1 year ago

I mean, technically there's no new tax or anything here, they're just forcing companies to report the income so people can't get away with not paying their taxes on the profit. Now if only they'd enforce the tax laws on rich people, they'd easily make way more than this whole scheme will make by targeting a single billionaire.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

Scalpers are absolutely the worst.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

I pay my taxes and you should, too. I have no sympathy in general for people not reporting income from PayPal etc, but I'm struggling to think of a less sympathetic subgroup of tax frauds than ticket scalpers. They're not getting special treatment here, it's any 1099 income via the payment apps, but I really wish that wasn't the case. These crooks should be taxed out of business.

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