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Gabby Douglas' medal comes with a generous check.
American Olympic medal winners won't just get hardware and national pride as a result of their success, they'll also receive a cash honorarium, including $25,000 for every gold medal. For some conservatives, this leads to a pressing question: is that taxable income?
Grover Norquist, The Weekly Standard, and Drudge all worried aloud this week about athletes having to pay a portion of their cash reward in taxes. One day later, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) leapt into action, unveiling the "Olympic Tax Elimination Act" to protect our Olympic medal winners from those rascals at the IRS.
Rubio said in a press release, "Athletes representing our nation overseas in the Olympics shouldn't have to worry about an extra tax bill waiting for them back home."
Conor Friedersdorf is unimpressed by the effort to create another special tax exemption.
The fact is that prize money from athletic victories is income, and there is no good reason for the government to treat that income differently than the income of all the non-Olympic athletes who earn analogous types of income. Why should Olympic athletes be exempted from paying taxes on their prize money, but not professional golfers, or poker players, or winners of literary prizes, or folks who win the lottery? [...]
[T]reating Olympic winnings as if they are singular and morally superior to other income, and even other prize income, cannot be justified, and least of all by someone who advocates tax code simplicity and objects to government picking winners and losers. Simplifying the American tax code is tremendously important. Rubio's proposal tries to trade on that importance, but it is no more than a cheap stunt, and the man proposing it seems not to realize that the impulse behind his bill is the very one he needs to defeat if he's serious about tax-code reform.
Ed Kilgore also questions Rubio's motivations as the senator tries to "hijack a nationally unifying sports event" in order to turn it into anti-tax message in an election year.
That said, I wouldn't be surprised if Rubio's bill gets quite a bit of attention -- and picks up quite a few co-sponsors.
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I have people complaining about this all over my facebook. People who think we've never done this before, it is an "invention of the Obama administration." -_-
Well, yeah. Obama is responsible for everything that Fox-toxxed facebookers are told to be upset about by the voices on the Internets, radio and teevee who tell them what to think. Didn't you know that? Everything that happens, or has ever happened, that the Fox-toxxed dislike happened for the first time in the last three years and specifically on Obama's orders.
Taxes? No one ever had to pay taxes until 2009. Bailouts? Obama's orders. Financial crash? Obama. The heatwave and drought? Obama. Aunt Gertie's hemorrhoids? Obama's fault.
All his fault. With the exception of a very, very few things that are conceded to have occurred between January 20, 2001 and January 20, 2009. Those things are, of course, Nancy Pelosi's fault.
Why wasn't it an issue in 2004 or 2008? Oh, right, white Republican President, gotcha...
Having snarked that, I'm sure it will get quite a few BIPARTISAN cosponsors. And in a way, I'm ok with that. Yeah, it's "income," but it's income generated by representing your country, as the best of what your country can do and all that other patriotic jazzercise. And considering how few Olympic athletes ever parlay their rewards into longer-lasting careers, and how many of the sports are low-profile enough that they never get seriously lucrative endorsement gigs, let them keep the few extra scheckles...
of course the pitfall to that is, if they're getting tax-exempt status for "representing" the USA, how about other federal jobs of representation? Ambassadorships? Security? Politicians? Could be a gateway bill...
I don't have a problem with it , but I'll go with "a cheap stunt"
Does this also apply to the mega-buck paydays they will all receive from endorsements?
Yeah. Its a cheap stunt, but even as blue as I am I would sign on with Marcocito were I in the Senate.
No it does not apply to the endorsement deals
I have a huge problem with it.
I love the Olympics. I love these kids. I love it when America athletes win gold as much as any jingoistic wingnut.
But the idea that there are some ways of earning a living that are inherently more worthy of preferential tax treatment than others simply by virtue of the fact that only Superior Beings can engage in such activity is pretty much the entire tax argument of our Galtian Overlords on Wall Street and the faux-libertarians like Paul Ryan in a nutshell. It is precisely why Rubio is on this. Because Gabby is a far more sympathetic poster child for that argument than some lardass in a Range Rover demanding VIP parking at a Romney fundraiser.
Make no mistake: in the minds of the top .1%, they're "special" just like Olympic athletes are special and deserving of exactly the same adulation as any mere athlete.
Income is income and ought to be treated the same for tax purposes regardless of how--or whether-- it's earned.
I have no problem with deductions and credits to encourage people to spend their income in particular ways that are deemed economically--or even merely socially--beneficial. I have a huge problem with differentiating between types of income.
Steve is precisely right. This is bone-headed wrong. And nauseating.
I still like it and how many people does it affect? Not many and most of them are kids who will never be seen on a Wheaties box and the money involved is miniscule. Taking it a step further if we want to tax this why not lets tax football scholarships? They are worth far more, there are more of them and they are income.
Purity can be its own worst enemy.
These are desperate times for our right winged loons.As they face extiction they strive for ways to make themselves seem all cuddly. If rattlesnakes had to compete with Pandas for protection...
I'd just like to point out that our military also represents our country (in a way that could get them killed) and they pay taxes.
Marco is trying to score some cheap political points off of someone else's hard work, and I'm sure that I and anyone else opposed to it will be called unpatriotic and/or worse.
Right. If you want to talk about tax exempting active military (not just deployed) then we can have a conversation that makes some sense. But exempting athletes, Olympic or otherwise, is a bad and inappropriate idea. Risking your life for me is very different than performing for me, or even in my name.
Rubio is just missing all the attention he was receiving, as a potential nominee for VP. The Olympics are great, they give people something to cheer for in our troubling times. Half of $25,000.00 is more than many of us will ever see in our lifetime. The athletes have accepted this for a long time now. I'm sure they would much rather Rubio be fighting for something more appropriate at this time, like The Middle class and the poor. He could lead the Republican fight against Voter Suppression. Which I don't beleive any of the GOP are working on, they're letting the Democrats deal with all the Human Rights Issues by themselves. Rubio would happen to pick a topic or an issue that proves irrelevant in our tough economic times, instead of helping the President on Trabajos.
How do other countries handle this?
Come on, folks, wake up! This the 21st century, not the 19th, when amateurs only competed.
Now it is a Big Business, and all the participants, from the athletes themselves, to their trainers, sponsors, and lobbyists (lookin' at YOU, Mitt in Salt Lake) are part of this professional group!
And they should be taxed accordingly- that is to say at little, or nothing at all. (Job creators, all!)
Every patriotic American should believe that there should be a tax exemption on all income of Olympic athletes.
Lebron James needs our help.
I can't remember ... do we have tax exemptions for Active Duty Combat Veterans? I think they might rate tax relief before we give it to the Olympians.
I'm all for lessening the tax burden for 16 year old kids who are going to want that bit of prize cash to pay for some of their college expenses or help family pay back the loans which have covered the years of training, equipment and travel.
But tax breaks for millionaire professional basketball players, just because they are participating in the Olympics? Not so much.
So where do you draw the line?
And yet again, we have another entry into the ever-widening category:
"YOU CAN NOT KEEP UP WITH THE STUPIDITY OF REPUBLICANS" (and especially their dumba$$ Useful Idiots)
It just isn't possible to get ahead of this curve. It cannot be predicted.
Why should Olympic athletes be exempted from paying taxes on their prize money, but not professional golfers, or poker players, or winners of literary prizes, or folks who win the lottery?
I have a better question. Why should Olympic athletes be exempted from paying taxes on their incomes, but not cashiers, hotel maids, construction workers, factory workers, nurses, police, or teachers?
While we're on the subject, ALL sources of income should be taxed at the same rates...whether it's income from a investments, inheritances, winning an Olympic medal, or setting our alarms and going to work every day.
{cynic hat: ON}
Hey Rubio.... does this include all Olympic medal winners, like the Special Olympics and the Paralympics? Or only the ones that get shown on TV?
Bah.
Never miss an opportunity to pander. Just another knee-jerk response to some event showing Rubio's shortsighted thinking. And another reason he's not qualified to be a Senator, let alone VP.
Well, just look at the misery in Gabby Douglas's face in that picture up there. You'd think winning an Olympic gold medal would be a special moment, but she's been robbed of the thrill of victory by the knowledge that she MIGHT HAVE TO PAY TAXES!!!!!
Bottom line: It's income - just like any other income - and should not be exempted from being taxed. Currently, military personnel who are not in a combat zone are taxed. If anyone should be exempted it should be the military. Why do these Congressmen hate America if they can't exempt ALL military from income taxes.