[MAGZine]

So when are we going to pay taxes for writing OSS? I mean, it was either taught to us by government-subsidized education, or we learnt it from the internet which is also government subsidized. The licenses which you license your software under are a product of the legal climate, generated by the legal system, etc etc etc.

Look, all of this is ridiculous. I'm all for taxing business, but honestly, taxes on the house (the structure itself, the materials) have been long paid, and property taxes are being paid. If anything, I'd think that this would be a zoning issue, which would be handled by municipalities. But even then, I tend to agree that unless if your neighbors are taking issue with it, then taxes/fees should be kept at an absolute minimum, if not zero.

e: on top of that, the money which he used to buy his house (with tax) as well as pay the annual property tax is ITSELF taxed by income tax. How many levels of taxing are appropriate? Honestly.

[Xylakant]

> So when are we going to pay taxes for writing OSS?

Yes, sure, absolutely, we already do. It's a percentage of what you earned writing said OSS. I sometimes get paid by clients to write code that later gets open sourced and yes, sure, I pay regular income tax on that. If you didn't earn any money, well then the government cut is zero USD, just as it is when you give your room away for free to strangers.

[MAGZine]

I can't say I disagree with any of this, though it still feels wrong to otherwise pay taxes on something like renting a room in this instance. It's your property, what business is it of the government's?

[Xylakant]

Rent income is income.

> It's your property, what business is it of the government's?

You could argue that renting an apartment puts a burden on the community - the people that rent it need to drive there, they use public roads and public resources. However, that argument is false. The argument behind taxes is that there is a government that allocates certain resources towards community goals - security, infrastructure, welfare. These resources need to be paid for and so the government raises taxes - on income, on property, on cars etc. All the money collected gets redistributed and none of it is tied to the sector it came from: My income tax pays for roads, railways, kindergardens alike even though I don't own a car and rarely drive and don't have any kids. And the legislative decided that renting a room is a taxable action and that's it - like it or not. It's really as simple as that.

[auctiontheory]

You don't have absolute property rights.

I am not a lawyer, but I believe that lawyers spend lots of time discussing who has "an interest" in whatever issue. In any given case there can be multiple competing "rights" and "interests." Your property rights are only one among those. Property rights do not trump all other rights and interests. (I'm sure I'm not using the precise terminology, but you get the idea.)

Here's one link: http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Balancing+of+C...