Comment by thow16161 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by thow16161 | Hacker News Reader

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Any unexpected expense can knock you down when you're on the edge. Unexpected expenses are how people become homeless.

I am friends with a camgirl who is a prime example of this. In her case, she made a go of full-time camming, and thought she was doing well. What she didn't understand is that the site she worked for paid her as a contractor and withheld nothing. She never thought much about taxes, and all her previous jobs had withheld taxes, so she didn't pay quarterly estimated taxes. Last month, when she went to file her taxes, she realized she owed thousands. She has been struggling to pay this while other unexpected expenses mount (car repairs). She's struggling with the decision on whether to pay her taxes or her rent, and is about to become homeless.

The super irritating thing to me is that she had a gofundme setup for her friends and family to donate to help with her tax issue. The campaign was going well (close to 50% complete) but gofundme took it down and refunded all the donations. This was likely because they don't want to be associated with sex workers, and she apparently had a link to it from her cam-site page.

That reminds me: Does anybody know of any US crowdfunding sites that are not hostile to sex workers? That seems unlikely after FOSTA, but it does not hurt to ask, and I figure this would be the place to do it.

Probably best to talk to a tax advisor-- and I am not one. I think the first time you owe a lot in taxes you are not assessed a penalty (if you keep owing every year, you are). This filing season is also exceptional due to tax bracket changes last year.

She can pay in installments vs the entire sum at once: https://www.irs.gov/payments/payment-plans-installment-agree...

I've been trying to encourage her to do just this, but she does not always take my advice. She had her mind set on putting this behind her. She does not always make the best decisions.

Why go through a third party which will take a cut of the donation. If it is primarily money donated by friends and family, can they not talk directly through phone or email?

I meant to say "friends of family". Think grandparents friends at church, aunt's co-workers, etc.

Bitcoin? It doesn't really have a crowdfunding site per se, but "people who moral guardians hate" is basically the number two reason for its existence, right after "people who lawmakers/financial regulators hate".

Sure, but bitcoin may be hard for her grandparents friends at church to figure out, for example. Heck, I've worked for tech companies, and I can't figure it out. Gofundme is comparatively easy to explain.

True. There's probably a business opprotunity in there somewhere for a payment processor with a policy of never disputing chargebacks, since that's the main excuse used to kill crowdfunding/patronage platforms that don't play along with moral guardians.

I feel like crowdfunding someone's taxes is pretty weird and doesn't sit right with me. Assuming her income is rather steady I think a loan is precisely what someone should get in this situation.

I agree, if you can get it.

But credit rating counts for a lot.

Even if they can prove sufficient steady income, if they don't have a good credit rating, there's a good chance they are unable to get a bank loan, credit card (or additional credit if they have a card already), and perhaps not even a small overdraft.

I can't speak for the US, but in the UK, even "payday lenders" who charge >1000% APR rates will no longer lend to someone with a poor credit rating.

On top of that, for someone who isn't used to it, and who already lives on the edge of what they can afford, "thousands", probably at high interest, is a big loan they may reasonably worry would put them into an unrecoverable debt spiral.

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