Philadelphia to tax certain blogs

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Bloggers crying foul over Philly business tax - Yahoo! News

More or less, the gist of this story is if you make any level of income from blogging, the city of Philadelphia considers your blog a business if you:

- Accept advertising on your blog and gain some money from it
- Sell photographs or other goods through the blog

Even if what you make is less than $50 a year from it, you have to cough up $50 a year or $300 for a lifetime, so says the city's business rules.

Sounds like a cheap shot at people who aren't really business owners, small time artists and musicians or anyone who's just passionate about sharing knowledge about a hobby or profession. There are all sorts of reasons to be blogging - most of it just for the sake of personal interest - but I think people are entitled to a little compensation if its warranted.

Even within the journalistic profession, there are times where you must pay out of your own pocket to help generate content. Papers and websites out there don't get promotional material and press releases just for existing, you have to get on the radar. Hell, this even applies to college papers if you're not at some big-name university.

Anyway, doesn't take much to see that this will be struck down, let's just hope the trend doesn't expand.

[Nandito]

Re: Philadelphia to tax certain blogs

Oh hell no, shit just got real.

[Feba]

Re: Philadelphia to tax certain blogs

Why should a source of income be exempt from taxes just because it's on the internet? If you make a bunch of money mowing lawns, you'd still be expected to pay taxes on it.

This sounds like it's not actually a tax, but a fee for a business license, is that it? It is stupid to expect people to buy a business license when they're not actually running a business. It's like a city going after lemonade stands and babysitting high schoolers. But there are a lot of blogs out there which are businesses, and should be subject to the same rules as any business that had a physical address that sent out the same information as pamphlets or the like.

[Cotners]

Re: Philadelphia to tax certain blogs

How would they even govern this? Track IP addresses for all the blogs on the internet?

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Philadelphia to tax certain blogs

Why should a source of income be exempt from taxes just because it's on the internet? If you make a bunch of money mowing lawns, you'd still be expected to pay taxes on it.

Because the internet isn't a place known as Philadephia?
Because of Freedom of Speech?
Because being made to pay out $50 to $300 for making seven bucks on a blog all year defies logic, common sense and even mathematical applications?

This sounds like it's not actually a tax, but a fee for a business license, is that it? It is stupid to expect people to buy a business license when they're not actually running a business. It's like a city going after lemonade stands and babysitting high schoolers. But there are a lot of blogs out there which are businesses, and should be subject to the same rules as any business that had a physical address that sent out the same information as pamphlets or the like.

Except in this case, the city actually is going after something that more or less amounts to a lemonade stand.

[Feba]

Re: Philadelphia to tax certain blogs

Because the internet isn't a place known as Philadephia?

Omigawd, really? MY HOUSE ISN'T A STATE. WHY SHOULD I PAY PROPERTY TAXES?

Because of Freedom of Speech?

We still tax plenty of other methods of producing and publishing media, when they set out to make a profit. Hence why you have to be a recognized non-profit to not pay taxes. Hence why towns love it when Hollywood comes to town; they don't just pump in a lot of money, they pump in a lot of tax money. Hollywood still has free speech. But free speech doesn't mean free of taxes on profit earned, any more than free speech means "hey man, I have a right to download this, it's FREE speech!"

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Philadelphia to tax certain blogs

Again, Feba, the problem is that they are going after blogs that cannot realistically be defined as a business.

Does selling one thing on Amazon make me a business? Is selling a photograph once because someone wanted a copy of what you posted on your blog a business?

The answer is "no."

And when you fine/tax someone for making a few bucks on something they posted, is that not a act of discouraging expression?

They answer would be "yes," because you essentially issued a financial punishment to someone that wasn't running a business. If they were running a business or making a substantial supplemental income, we'd be talking about a business, but there are instances where that is clearly not the case and its happening anyway.

Taxes, fines and fees have been known to be used to discourage certain behaviors, but to issue the fine to something that isn't a business and is a forum for expression is censorship any way you cut it.

[Feba]

Re: Philadelphia to tax certain blogs

Again, Feba, the problem is that they are going after blogs that cannot realistically be defined as a business.

Which I already said is stupid, if it's the case. Reading comprehension, my friend.

[Malacite]

Re: Philadelphia to tax certain blogs

I don't entirely disagree with this idea, but there really needs to be very specific criteria met IMO before they go through with taxing any particular site such
as exactly how much income it's generating. What pisses me off though is there are a lot of "free" sites I love to go to that have adds on them as a way to pay for the site itself,
and only that reason in which case they'd end up having to pay to run the site because of taxes.