| jeffweico | 08-25-2014 02:50 PM |
Re: IRS and eBay/Paypal is too greedy
You owe taxes when you make a profit on an item you purchase, regardless of whether it is new or used. So, if you bought an old comic book for $100 fifteen years ago and sold it for $1,000 today, you would owe taxes on $900.
If you bought a laptop 5 years ago for $1,200 and sold it as used on eBay for $200, you would not owe taxes on it. But, if you bought a bunch of old laptops for $100 each and sold them for $200 each, then taxes are due on the profits from your sales.
Aspkin is absolutely correct. The IRS WILL tax you at every opportunity. There was even one poor guy, a baseball fan, who was lucky enough to catch a ball during an important game. He wanted to keep it, it was like a dream for him to have that ball. But then the IRS got involved and told him they had estimated the market value of the ball at something like $100,000 and if he wanted to keep the ball, he would have to pay taxes on it - even though he did not want to sell it.
In fact, did you know that if you default on a debt and it is written off, you may owe taxes on that amount? Let's say you stop paying your $6,000 MasterCard bill. The credit card company, after a certain period of time, writes off the $6,000 as a loss. You get a few calls from a collection agency and tell them to go to hell. Then one day, you get a tax bill from the IRS for the taxes due on the $6,000. It makes no difference that you had to stop paying your bills because you lost your job and were trying to pay your medical bills. Nice, huh? | 
