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Comment by dancek | Hacker News Reader

Well, all taxation can be considered unreasonable. It's true that the system doesn't work similarly for cryptocurrencies and stock, but that's no reason not to pay your taxes. It's not like the system came as a surprise to the people who sold crypto in 2017.

My personal experience is that most Finns whine about taxes, yet they also complain if healthcare and infrastructure and education isn't perfect and completely free. I feel that as a smart responsible adult it's better to be happy that I have income to pay taxes for, and be grateful of everything the taxes pay for. If I didn't like the way things are done in Finland, I'm free to move elsewhere (or take up politics, get elected and change everything the way I like it).

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Well, yes but the parent is complaining about taxes on a net financial loss. This is really unjust and something difficult to support.

It sounds like it's being taxed like gambling rather than investing. You don't get to write off a massive loss at the casino, and if you have a net loss you still owe on the nights you came out ahead.

In the US gambling losses are deductible, to the limit of your winnings, according to this. https://www.google.com/amp/s/turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tips/jo...

But not in Finland. So at least their tax law has symmetry in this regard.

That is the same in all countries, everyone wants to pay less taxes and get everything for free.

There's a big difference between complaining about the tax level, or even the tax distribution, and what's going on here, which is completely insane. Paying taxes on a net loss is an absolutely crazy structure that no sane government should be imposing. It's so insane i'm skeptical it's even true, but if it is, he's absolutely right to be upset about it.

Why is it insane? Its like winning the power ball and then blowing it all on scratchers. You owe taxes on the win but can't necessarily deduct the losses.

Which, tbh, seems perfectly fine to me.

As someone else pointed out upthread, gambling losses are tax deductible to the extent of your winnings: https://turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tips/jobs-and-career/can-you...

In the US. Not in Finland.

A better analogy might be blackjack. Let's say you are playing blackjack for an hour, and at the end of that hour, you're up $1,000. But you decide to play for another hour, and now you're down $1,000. You think you should still have to pay tax on the transient $1,000 win?

Your ethical argument is a bit weak. If society sees Bitcoin as a bad thing then there's no reason why they shouldn't slap a huge tax on any gross transaction, be it 34% or 340%. There are many ways to view cryptocurrencies in a bad light. It is a scheme that some claim seeks to subvert the fiat money systems that are controlled by these national tax authorities, so you can see why they would be upset. It is also, to a large extent, just gambling. Finally, it is a money system mainly used by organized criminals to launder money. In short there is no ethical argument against taxing it, any more than there is against US tax code for gambling (you cannot deduct a net gambling loss against your other income in USA).

> Finally, it is a money system mainly used by organized criminals to launder money.

Citation needed.

Sure, but the claim isn't that this is a Bitcoin tax. The claim is that it's a tax on all capital gains. Which is unbelievably stupid.

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