There are three certainties in the life of Luke Sidewalker.
1)Finding money on the sidewalk
2)Taxes
3)Death
Number three I'm OK with. I'm very comfortable with my own mortality. It is the relationship between one and two that is my problem. It had not occurred to me, until it was pointed out to me the other day, that the IRS (the taxman in the U.S.A. for my overseas readers) treat found money as income! I'm not an accountant, so if anyone believes this statement to be false I'd be more than happy to hear from them (fingers crossed).
If it turns out to be true then the question is, how much money do I have to blog about finding before the IRS arrests me on tax evasion charges? And if I do get arrested, could I just not say that I dropped all the money I found on the sidewalk on the way to court? Which leads to an even bigger question, if they treat found money as income, can I use money that I've dropped over my lifetime as a tax loss/deduction?
Knowing the tax code here I would probably have to pay tax on the found money, and the lost money would just be 'my bad'. Maybe I could just employ myself as a coin collector, but then I would be saddled with a payroll tax no doubt!
This post has created more questions than answers. Help anyone?
In other news, my Staycation is looking for a hit from Norway, so if you know anyone located there please forward them the link. Thanks.
-Luke Sidewalker
-Current balance $21.05
