There has been a significant amount of reporting on language tucked into the Biden Administration’s proposed $3.5 trillion dollar budget proposal that would purportedly require banks to report transactions in accounts with over $600 in annual activity to the IRS. Understandably, gun owners and those who want to exercise their Second Amendment protected rights were immediately concerned.
Does that mean the IRS would be notified of nearly every firearm purchased from a retailer? Would they be notified of large ammunition purchases? How about some of the more expensive accessories?
Such reporting to the IRS could create a de facto gun registry. And a federal list of certain ammunition and firearm accessory purchases.
We can only imagine how this information would be abused by the IRS and the current Administration. But is this reporting requirement actually the case?
The Reporting
Biden’s “$600 reporting requirement” has been extensively reported in two different ways.
Some have said that the requirement would mandate that banks disclose every transaction of $600 or more to the IRS. In other words, the IRS would be notified of every one of your purchases of over $599.
Others have reported that financial institutions would have to report every transaction to and from accounts with a balance of more than $600. Based on some posts and a notice sent out by some local banks, this is the one that got me.
But, neither of these appears to be the actual proposal.
The Proposal
In actuality, the proposal, described in the Department of Treasury’s General Explanations of the Administration’s Fiscal Year 2022 Revenue Proposals, is stylized “Introduce Comprehensive Financial Account Reporting to Improve Tax Compliance.”
This proposal would require financial institutions to “report gross inflows and outflows with a breakdown for physical cash, transactions with a foreign account, and transfers to and from another account with the same owner.”
The proposal would exempt “accounts below a low de minimis gross flow threshold of $600 or fair market value of $600.”
This does not mean that banks would report on each and every transaction of $600 or more. Instead, banks would be required to disclose the total flow of funds in and out of an account so long as that total was more than $600.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, during a Congressional Oversight Hearing, stated that the proposal would require the “aggregate inflows and outflows from these accounts each year,” and “not transactional level data.” This would be reported as new fields on the existing 1099-INT form.
Apparently, the IRS has withdrawn the proposal, but Secretary Yellen is pushing for its re-inclusion. Some politicians have remained vigilant in opposition.
The Takeaway
What does this mean for gun owners?
It means that, as of today, there is no proposal to require the IRS to track individual purchases. Banks will not be reporting transactions of $600 or more, nor will they be reporting on all transactions from accounts containing $600 or more. Yesterday, press reports indicated that the administration is adjusting their proposal from $600 in annual transactions to $10,000, an amount that would still cover a large percentage of American.
It also appears that the aggregate inflow and outflow reporting is in question and might not be implemented at all.
Even so, we should remain vigilant. The federal government does not have the constitutional authority to monitor the flow of funds in and out of our bank accounts any more than they have the authority to monitor individual transactions.
As the gun community is well aware, these regulatory changes are often a slippery slope. It’s always best to keep your powder dry.
Cody J. Wisniewski (@TheWizardofLawz) is the director of Mountain States Legal Foundation’s Center to Keep and Bear Arms. He primarily focuses on Second Amendment issues but is happy so long as he is reminding the government of its enumerated powers and constitutional restrictions.
To learn more about the Center to Keep and Bear Arms’ work and support their fight for your natural right to self-defense—from both man and tyranny—visit www.mslegal.org/2A and donate today!
It’d be a vast over reach, and is completely tyrannical, but there are a million+1 ways to bypass any attempt to surveil our finances. Create a law, congrats you’ve created the incentive for people to work around said law. Eat sh-t, soup-bois!
Jim Crow Gun Control joe and his ilk are to business and prosperity what drunk farting gasbags are to fine dining.
Cash is king.
They have been trying to replace cash with digital currency only. The U.S is currently proposing a national version of its own crypto currency like china. So any untracable freedom with cash may soon be going by the way side.
Yeah! Stick it those billionaires not paying their fair share…………….by scrutinizing every $600 transaction.
Too bad these faux commie retards who vote Dem never learn. They also tossed in an extra 10 bill for the war machine while subtracting 10 bill for their free comm. college scheme.
I am wondering if there is some other ulterior motive for such monitoring. Is it simply to acquire a giant list of all bank accounts and their balances so that fedzilla can easily raid those accounts?
(Isn’t that what happened recently in Greece when the Greek government was unable to resolve their fiscal crisis and ultimately just raided everyone’s bank accounts?)
Or worse: is that some sort of data/access prerequisite to implementing “modern monetary theory” or some such nonsense? Of course any ability to “see” firearm transactions would be frosting on the proverbial cake.
Not just guns, but just about any hobby. Coin collecting, remote controlled helicopters/airplanes. Rockets, telescopes, photography, off road anything, fixing up a camping property. Musical instruments and garage bands, hell even cloth and blanket weaving, leather craft, etc. As inflation creeps up, even your weekly grocery shopping will get flagged.
This will kill and neighborhood exchange – like the guy that puts eggs out for people to honor buy or trade for fruit/vegetables or helpful services like mowing a lawn or help with painting or fixing a fence. This puts a monetary value on anything you might do to help your neighbor or anything he might do to help you. This will just force the barter system to become more prevalent, until the government starts arresting people to build a snitch army, like Stalin did.
A snitch army is precisely the goal.
Biden needs a big fermented cow’chip slapped in his grinning puce of a mug!
It would not do any good, he’d wouldn’t remember it five minutes later.
BUCK FIDEN…🖕🏿
lets go Brandon
Cash transactions hand to hand will never have a record. Easy enough, have multiple accounts with $9000 in each. It appears that any monitor of bank accounts is a direct violation of the 4th amendment. With no crime how would they ever apply for and be issued a search warrant. However, might as well as close accounts and keep money elsewhere if this bill passes. .
per the article, they’d be reporting CASH FLOW in agregate of => $10K per account. YYour idea of muliple accounts in different institutions is what I’ve been doing for years. No major activity in any of them. I started one exclusively for PayPal transactions, after the rotters messed up and slammed by daily working account for $700 in error.. took me four months to get PayPal to fix it, meanwhile my working account was trashed. No more. PayPal gets one place to dump payments, and since I always get it out at the ATM wihtin a few days, nothing for them to try and grab. I could easily start moving other money through that one too. Aon and on. Moslty cash, though……
I hold gummit to a strict “need to know” basis. And they mostly do not “need to know” so they don’t.
Fakebook, Twatter, PayPuc – all marxist SOBs
It looks like the current “modified” version does not contain the $600 reporting rule however the 80 billion for expansion of the IRS IS still in there… Guess the Dems finally learned rule #1 of business “you’ve got to spend money to make money” EVEN if it is other peoples money…. “Let’s go Brandon”…
nah, it’s more like “the cattle must be forced to make money before we can spend money.”
Keep in mind that any time your “government” wants to take away any thing they wish, they float these “proposals”. When they get the expected push back they then “withdraw” or “scale back”. Note that the proposal has not died. They are merely trying to find a way to implement it that we sheeple will accept.
They are merely trying to find a way to implement it that we sheeple will accept.
This time they actually cut the time period for renewal from 10 years to 2 and it is still nearly 2 trillion dollars AND once it’s passed it will still be renewed into perpetuity… Hope Mancins balls hold up under the pressure and Sinema stays pissed about Braindeads comments over the “bathroom incident”..
No matter how you word it, my banking account is still none of their fucking business.
Let’s go Brandon!
Cash comrade cash. Dedicated safe and/or mattress. Yeah your card is conveniant and you get “points” but never buy gunz with a card. Until all currency is digital anyhow. You’ve been warned…I’ve never bought gunz or ammo or accessory items with anything but cash.
Sure, and the Big Guy says that $3.5 trillion bill isn’t actually going to cost anything.
“What Does Biden’s Proposal for IRS Monitoring of Bank Account Information Mean for Gun Owners?”
it means whatever you’re going to do, do it now.
I get what’s going on here. They are looking for methods of detecting that tax evasion is going on, so they can identify accounts that should be referred for investigation. That will be an aid in fighting money laundering by criminals, organized crime, drug dealers, etc.
The $600 level was far too low for this. Makes no sense, most Americans would have much more than that in transaction amounts per month, let alone per year. If the behavior is an indication of possible criminality, I’d expect much higher annual dollar amounts.
I do see a reason too for the politicians rolling this one back that has nothing at all to do with taxpayer outrage or Constitutional protectionism. Simply, those politicos have finances that land most of them in the bracket of likely reporting and potential referral for investigation. The “Hold on, this would include us in with the unwashed masses” factor would not makep them olitico’s at all happy.
So, naturally, the proposal was pulled back and is being rethought.
“That will be an aid in fighting money laundering by criminals, organized crime, drug dealers, etc”
sure. but to them, “criminals” means everyone who isn’t them or working for them. just like “terrorists” and “insurrectionists” and so on.
“They are looking for methods of detecting that tax evasion”
Oh come on enuf. You don’t really believe that do you? They aren’t necessarily trying to find a way to go after criminals. They want the ability to check out the people they don’t like. They’ll use prosecutorial discretion to go after their political rivals, and look they other way when it’s someone like Hunter. Getting warrants is like such a hassle man.
“Yesterday, press reports indicated that the administration is adjusting their proposal from $600 in annual transactions to $10,000…”
That’s still a no go. Anyone in business will eventually make a $10,000+ transaction. When they enacted the Bank Secrecy Act, $10,000 was a lot of money. If they want to keep that, they should update it to an inflation-adjusted rate of $75,000.
Once again, the surveillance state is sticking its nose where it doesn’t belong. I’m telling ya, things like this would never happen if Joe Biden was still alive.
Forty acres and a mule.
Those days are over.
Control the money and you control the populace.
I run 360 acres an a couple teams of horses. 40 acres just doesn’t grow enough to feed all of us and produce enough income to cover things like clothing, coffee, whiskey, and ammunition. Good thing you don’t live down here. While it’s not on my regular menu, a couple of my neighbors think possum is a delicacy.
If large transactions going to and from bank accounts are going to be reported, they are going to get a lot of salaries being paid in and a lot of mortgages and utility bills going out. As well as credit card payments and car loans.
no problem, they’ll have a computer algorithm sort through it all and flag anything that they want brought to their direct attention.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
I don’t understand where probable cause assists in this garbage regulation.
I totally agree, Where is the crime that allows a search warrac nt for your personal records? Most congressmen and women and senators are lawyers, and they never bring up the 4th amendment? Really. It is becoming apparent the only solution is revolution.
Who’s the authoritarian again?
I see this as an attempt to reduce the cash society. Paying bills with a check (does anybody still do that?) direct bank transfers or even credit cards leave a paper (or digital)trail. Pure cash transactions are still untraceable. How about ,say, a tradesman doing a service for cash…how can you maintain such a nice home and a new car???? The government wants a piece of all that !!Inherited an estate then liquidated, where’s Uncle Sams percentage? sold a collection of anything? Unc wants his vig. The feds are spending so much money that they are trying to grab every dime they think is due them. AH !! A government digital currency? that’ll do it !!
It’s not just guns, it’s EVERYTHING!!!!!!
If I’m reading the updated proposal correctly, doesn’t this just mean reporting for transactions from “foreign accounts,” (as in non-U.S.) and accounts between the same owner (like how some people might try to hide money between their different accounts)? Not saying they didn’t or don’t still intend to monitor us into 1984, but this seems more focused on tax evasion and mony laundering. Unless the “foreign” actually means any account that isn’t yours.
This is a little outdated. Because of all the backlash the amount was changed from $600 to $10,000 before they begin to look at an account.
Doesn’t matter. There’s such a thing as 4A and 5A, no matter the amount one has. Contact your Senators and bring this measure crashing to the ground.
I don’t care what the “threshold amount is for reporting! The damn government has no right to know what I do with my own money PERIOD!!!
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