Comments on: Bonuses and taxation

By: paul mocker

paul mocker — Tue, 11 Jan 2005 02:58:44 +0000

I simply want you to back up your assertion that athletes are disproportionately audited.

I admire your mind, among other things, but you didn’t use it when you said “it exists and it sucks.” Jon and Westfried have provided ample evidence that there is no double taxation.

By: Kevin

Kevin — Fri, 07 Jan 2005 22:27:45 +0000

I’m late to this thread but have a contribution…I travel extensively as a consultant and taxation issues are currently a small concern. There are only a few states (most notably MA and CA)which aggressively pursue out-of-state wage earners who pass through their borders while working. My firm pays a small amount of taxes in these states, and as an owner I receive a small w-2 (or equivalent) from a few extra states each year, like one from MA for a couple hundred bucks. Sure we’d rather have the money than send it to fund art work for the big dig, but our bigger concern is the administative burden of tracking dozens of consultants across a hundred projects and forty-one states.

By: Evan

Evan — Fri, 07 Jan 2005 00:23:18 +0000

The province of Alberta imposed a tax like this that only applied to visiting NHL players (so those AAA players on the Edmonton Trappers were okay). Such taxes do exist.

By: DMZ

DMZ — Thu, 06 Jan 2005 23:27:58 +0000

I don’t know what else you want from me, really. When Portland was going to build their stadium, their funding mechanism relied on taxing the income of the players and of visiting players. I, and nobody else I know, gets taxed when they work on business that assigns them to Portland. Now if you want to argue that Oregon suddenly would have taxed every Seattle person who went down to work with Intel for a week if they’d built a stadium, that’s fine, but the fact remains — players all get taxed income when they play in income tax sites. People in normal industries do not.

I don’t have access to state taxation data from California, so I can’t prove that they taxed Pujols when he was in town, but they did. They didn’t tax me when I worked in San Jose for a week.

By: paul mocker

paul mocker — Thu, 06 Jan 2005 23:05:55 +0000

Since it isn’t a representative sample and the IRS and state taxation audit numbers are difficult if not impossible to access, I am skeptical of your claims that athletes are unfairly targeted.

By: DMZ

DMZ — Thu, 06 Jan 2005 17:10:35 +0000

I don’t have a study handy, but I know that it’s true: as noted up-thread, it’s easy and lucrative for states to look up team schedules and tax players that way. Tracking someone like me, who may travel to those states but doesn’t make that much money while I’m there, isn’t a good use of enforcement dollars.

So wait, I’ll do a quick study.
Everyone I know who travels a ton and doesn’t make much money: not taxed in other states
Every baseball player: taxed in other states

Take that for what you will. That’s not a representative sample of people who travel, of course, and so on and so forth.

By: paul mocker

paul mocker — Thu, 06 Jan 2005 15:47:26 +0000

DMZ
You pointed out in #2 that double taxation is unfair, “particularly enforced” and disproportionate. Do you have evidence that local tax agents are auditing athletes disproportionately in comparison to others?

By: G-Man

G-Man — Thu, 06 Jan 2005 05:45:42 +0000

I think some athletes may look at the tax issue, but others are more enamored with the gross contract amount. It’s more about respect or ego than what they end up with. Those guys who make eight-figure salaries can squeak by with the net of taxes.

I do suppose that the likes of Scott Boras use the tax issue to leverage a few more bucks out of teams in high-tax locales.

By: Matt Staples

Matt Staples — Thu, 06 Jan 2005 02:15:08 +0000

#24 — it appears you didn’t read the “for more than a few days or few weeks per year” qualifier in #3′s comment. Otherwise, I agree with your comments as pertinent to #3.

As for your dismissal of the analysis of the Canadian health care system, this would be the place to discuss its merits just as much as this would be the place to discuss all sorts of off-topic things. If, on the other hand, you simply don’t agree with the viewpoints espoused in the study, you may as well say so (which you may have done; I can’t tell). People will take seriously that which they desire to, and I doubt your hopes have much to do with it, at least as expressed in your comment above.

By: Evan

Evan — Thu, 06 Jan 2005 01:00:00 +0000

I’d dispute that all sales taxes are regressive. Sales taxes on necessary goods or services are regressive, but a sales tax applied only to items people can reasonably choose not to buy at all would be flat.