Go for the Gold! (Pay the IRS.)

[a kennedy]

Because conservatives are scrooges, the good folks at Americans for Tax Reform have gone through the fine print to find out what our Olympians will have to cough up to the IRS should they be lucky enough to win any medals in London.

Even by the standards of our government, the numbers are insane.

For instance: Americans who win bronze will pay a $2 tax on the medal itself. But the bronze comes with a modest prize—$10,000 as an honorarium for devoting your entire life to being the third best athlete on the planet in your chosen discipline. And the IRS will take $3,500 of that, thank you very much.

There are also prizes that accompany each medal: $25,000 for gold, $15,000 for silver, and $10,000 for bronze.

Silver medalists will owe $5,385. You win a gold? Timothy Geithner will be standing there with his hand out for $8,986.

So as of this writing, swimmer Missy Franklin—who's a high school student—is already on the hook for almost $14,000. By the time she's done in the pool, her tab could be much higher. (That is, unless she has to decline the prize money to placate the NCAA—the only organization in America whose nuttiness rivals the IRS.)

ATR notes that the real twist of the knife is that most other Olympians won't pay any taxes on their medals because America is one of only a handful of countries which taxes "worldwide" prize income earned overseas.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/go-gold-pay-irs_649187.html

WTH???

[Yeah Its Spin]

1. Bullshit

got a real link?

from your link: "You did not earn those medals! The government provided the roads and bridges that allowed you to attend practices". Silly athletes!

Read more: http://atr.org/win-olympic-gold-pay-irs-a7091#ixzz22JoCCkzn

[Gabi Hayes]

2. olympic winners should follow in the footsteps of Rmoney and

not pay taxes on income earned, or what?

[denverbill]

3. So apparently, all American Olympians are in the 35% tax bracket?

How are they earning so much money?

[yellowcanine]

4. Uh - this assumes the Olympian is it the 35% tax bracket and then the tax would be on the

prize money accompanying the medal, not the medal itself. Theoretically the IRS could tax the medals themselves on their intrinsic value, but they don't. The only athletes paying the kind of taxes mentioned would be ones who are earning a lot more money elsewhere. And why shouldn't they? Prize money is considered income whether one is an Olympic athlete, Pulitzer Prize winner, Nobel Prize winner, or professional boxer. And why are we repeating right wing screeds here without doing a modicum of fact checking?

Note:Americans for Tax Reform is not a reliable source for tax information. They are a right wing lobbying group so they will naturally exaggerate and make assumptions which put any kind of tax collection in the worst light possible.

Oh and I should also note that athletes could deduct training costs, etc which they incurred in order to win the prize money. So even saying they would have to pay x amount of taxes on a $25000 prize is not necessarily accurate. That is like saying a business man pays 35% on gross income. Of course they don't.

[Retrograde]

5. They can deduct this year's training costs

And travel to the Olympics and any trials or other related competitions, and any housing and meals costs associated with those meets, plus (I'm not a tax lawyer or accountant) I think they can also do income averaging to deduct certain expenses in years when they don't have any athletics income - much the way a certain Republican candidate does. Unless they get a big money contract for endorsements, most athletes don't get particularly rich from their sports - especially the "minor" ones like rowing or discus throwing.

[YungBoiSean]

6. Thanks

This story just started a discussion at my job with everyone getting up in arms! If this was a huge issue, you would have Olympians speaking out about it as well. It appears it's just another ploy by #Conservatives

[yellowcanine]

7. Still waiting for an explanation of why it was ok to present right wing memes on DU as fact.

A lot of misinformation here based on worst possible situations. Why is this ok?