First Government Office in the US To Accept Bitcoin As Payment (orlandosentinel.com) 42
Long-time Slashdot reader SonicSpike quotes the Orlando Sentinel: If cash, check or credit card seems too old-fashioned, Seminole County, Florida Tax Collector Joel Greenberg said this week his office will begin accepting bitcoin as payment for new IDs, license plates and property taxes starting next month. Greenberg said accepting bitcoin and bitcoin cash as a payment method will promote transparency and accuracy in payment.
"There's no risk to the taxpayer," said Greenberg, who has often raised eyebrows since his 2016 election by moves including encouraging certain employees with concealed-weapons permits to carry a firearm openly as a security measure. "Blockchain technology is the future of the whole financial industry."
A spokesperson for a neighboring county's tax collector said they had no plans to follow the move. "Frankly, I think the currency is so volatile that I donâ(TM)t think it makes sense."
And an official at a nearby county said bitcoin payments were "not on our to-do list", adding that no one in the county had requested the ability to pay their taxes in bitcoin.
"There's no risk to the taxpayer," said Greenberg, who has often raised eyebrows since his 2016 election by moves including encouraging certain employees with concealed-weapons permits to carry a firearm openly as a security measure. "Blockchain technology is the future of the whole financial industry."
A spokesperson for a neighboring county's tax collector said they had no plans to follow the move. "Frankly, I think the currency is so volatile that I donâ(TM)t think it makes sense."
And an official at a nearby county said bitcoin payments were "not on our to-do list", adding that no one in the county had requested the ability to pay their taxes in bitcoin.
There's no risk to the taxpayer (Score:1)
Correct, county/merchants don't hold so no risk (Score:5, Informative)
Not really... (Score:5, Informative)
BitPay is guaranteeing the exchange rate for long enough for the transaction to go through. So the tax office never actually takes Bitcoin - BitPay takes BitCoin, and sends cash to the government office. And presumably, BitPay gets a cut somewhere in there.
It's more or less like adding a new credit card processor, as far as the receiver of the payment is concerned.
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Joke's on them, I'm going to pay everything in Dogecoins. Let's see them haul five million dogecoins for tax payment.
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This perspective ignores the cost (and thus environmental harms) of traditional currencies (digital or federal reserve notes).
The cost of traditional fiat currency regardless of whether we are talking about ones and zeros in a computer or a printed / minted one are more significant than typically understood. It's not just the printing that has a cost. It's the movement of that money that comes at a price. If you talking printed or minted money there is the physical transport costs and production costs. This
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Your bank is screwing you.
Must be in the USA. Virtually all US banks screw you over on wire transfer fees which are multiples of what it costs in most other countries... because they can.
hm (Score:2)
And, by the way, didn't the other story today just say that quantum computing is about to break encryption in 5 years?
FALSE headline (Score:3)
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Who takes the risk, and the benefits? (Score:2)
Government relies on Bitpay cover the risk associated with volatility. Bitpay will make nice benefits or huge losses depending if bitcoin is rising or crashing vs USD. Is it just government promoting speculation?
Perhaps... except that Bitpay only guarantee the rate for 15 mn, and bitcoin transaction can make much more time to be processed. Hence government also takes a share in the volatility risk.
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I am pretty sure, that the government will never take the risk with volatility, they will just send the payer a bill for the difference.
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Perhaps... except that Bitpay only guarantee the rate for 15 mn, and bitcoin transaction can make much more time to be processed. Hence government also takes a share in the volatility risk.
Some simple searches would show this is false. Bitpay guarantees the exchange rate for 15 minutes, if your bitcoins arrive later they'll be converted at the current rate and if it's enough they'll pay the invoice, otherwise they'll just send you back a notification that you underpaid so try again. In which case it looks like you need to get a refund (2nd transaction fee) and pay again (3rd transaction fee). Not surprising since they don't know when you initiated the transfer, if you spent 14 minutes waiting
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No, it just converts it at the current rate. Which means you can underpay and have to pay again.
And even when BitCoin payments were taking days to transact, you can still get them done in 10 minutes - it just means you have to pay $50 in transaction fees since you set how much extra you need to pay. There's a default fee
When The Law Is Not The Law (Score:2)
Flawed logic (Score:2)
Greenberg said accepting bitcoin and bitcoin cash as a payment method will promote transparency and accuracy in payment.
I don't think BitCoin is what he thinks it is.