The $250/$500k is a one-time benefit and you will absolutely take advantage of it when you sell your home.
The idea of taxing this "profit" for the home owner would be insane. The investment and re-investment in real-estate drives a big majority of the economy.
I'm for modifying 1031 for investors who rent their properties. \
What's going on here in Myanmar should be a lesson to all people.
Here is the US, I'd like to see a lobby to have Communications Act amended to remove any power of the government or business to shut down communications networks, systems or inter-connections.
This idea that governments can protect us from ourselves is foolish.
The Myanmar military’s coup, and the killing of hundreds of protesters, were already illegal.
If the US joint chiefs of staff arrested the president and congress, the CEO of T-mobile would not refuse to switch off mobile networks if half a dozen marines with loaded ARs showed up at his house with an order to do so.
Absolutely. However it still would be nice if it US Government didn't have the legal authority to do so. There is a difference between an internet kill switch controlled and required by the government ala russia and marines storming T-Mobile's HQ. Not to mention the optics matter, even to dictators.
> the CEO of T-mobile would not refuse to switch off mobile networks if half a dozen marines with loaded ARs showed up at his house with an order to do so.
If people with guns threatened me and the way out was to turn off a network, I think I’d do as they ‘asked’.
It's not like a law is going to stop a malicious government from literally cutting a connection.
Do you really mean to propose that network operators not be able to disconnect from people that don't pay or are disruptive to their operations? I feel like you need to be a little more clear about what responsibilities you think private entities have.
Myanmar has a government that's afraid of its people. It's not working out so great.
What seems to work best is when the government and the people like each other, and nobody's afraid. That doesn't mean that they have to agree, but it does mean that they disagree politely, and seek to resolve disagreements with compromises that everybody can live with.
That requires a certain amount of trust and good faith. Once there's widespread fear, it's not going to end well for anybody.
There are several sibling posts saying we don’t have to worry about the US government cutting communications. That’s just not true. A major US transit agency halted cell service to disrupt protests: https://www.aclunc.org/blog/five-years-later-barts-cell-serv....
but again, if it gets as bad as in Myanmar, a)laws wont help b) we will have bigger problems.
Is shutting down internet a small step towards a coup, as opposed to being the fruit of one? In the case of the US, i don't think it's likely short or medium term.
What about police abusing this power? That's a local government problem, not a national one, so it's different to what's going on in myanmar.
> if it gets as bad as in Myanmar, a)laws wont help b) we will have bigger problems
It gets as bad as it has in Myanmar when one doesn't have those laws. If you ban cutting communications, it normalizes the expectation. Cutting communications now becomes personally and politically risky in a way it isn't if it's in the grey area.
For an example, see India's slow slide into authoritarianism in this respect. Cutting communications in Kashmir was legal, but iffy. That normalized, legally and culturally, the mechanism. Now, communications are routinely cut across the country.
All that said, Myanmar fell to a military coup. That's a different failure mechanism from elected leaders getting too comfortable on their thrones.
> What's going on here in Myanmar should be a lesson to all people.
Yes. The lesson is that when your country is taken over by a military coup, and guys with assault rifles come to shut down the internet, pre-existing laws and rhetoric about free speech and open access and all that other good stuff become completely irrelevant.
You are looking at a wet street, and are claiming that it caused rain.
If you actually want to prevent this from happening here, the step that you should worry about is the coup and the killings, not the internet getting shut down in the following week.
The irony is that a few years ago everyone thought the telco's were going to be the ones to control what you see/do on the internet. lol
Has this become an anti-trust issue (assuming there is a way to tie it to the Sherman Act) based on monopoly power? Google and Apple have 99.83% market share, owning both the platforms and distribution? Is it time to break these up?
Hopefully someone here can shed some light on my limited understanding regulations, but aren't internet services, because they are inter-state in nature out of the jurisdiction of the state?
No, if they operate in the state then they are part of the state's jurisdiction. All terrestrial internet services would have to have some presence in the state otherwise they wouldn't be able to provide internet access. Multi-state entities have to follow the laws and regulations of each place they have a presence, not just federal laws.
Basically, if ~~the FCC~~ Verizon and Comcast loose in court, ISPs will be able to do as they please only in states with no net neutrality protections. They will have to follow both the FCC and state law otherwise.
In effect, this is highly likely to backfire. ISPs will have to spend more money than they claimed they did (before the repeal) in order to meet regulations.
I'm personally a bigger fan of mandated line sharing. This would actually foster competition. Furthermore, if the FCC were to protest it, it would be irrefutable evidence that they are captured and that NN wasn't repealed to foster competition at all.
Basically, if ~~the FCC~~ Verizon and Comcast loose in court
I don't think they will loose in court. Bows and Arrows wouldn't make it through the security check. (Commanders before the invention of firearms wouldn't be saying "fire" you see.)
> Basically, if ~~the FCC~~ Verizon and Comcast loose in court
You mean, if the win the challenge to the FCC repeal action and lose the effort to have that repeal preempt state neutrality laws. Win/win and Lose/moot are also possibilities.
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