

Regulators eye tech companies’ free food options - jmspring
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/04/the-tax-man-cometh-regulators-eye-tech-companies-free-food-options/

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jstanley
Ludicrous.

Are they also going to tax the chair you sit in? The computer you work on? The
electricity to provide lighting and run the computers?

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rayiner
What is "ludicrous" about it?

Two basic principles in the income tax are: 1) things that are "consumption"
are not tax deductible as business expenses; 2) compensation in kind is
identical to compensation in currency.

Food is a classical case of consumption as distinguished from a business
expense (chairs, work computers, etc). The theoretical basis is: you'd eat
whether or not you were at work, but you wouldn't necessarily need office
equipment if you weren't at work.

The effect of not taxing these beanies is regressive. The guy who works at
Wal-Mart pays for his lunch with post-tax dollars, the guy who works at Google
pays with pre-tax dollars.

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danielweber
Having a "company car" used to be a great perk, back when the tax code only
considered it compensation if it was dollars.

We don't want to go back to those days. There was so much energy being put
into working around the tax code and dead-weight from inefficient benefits.
Even if you only got $4000 of value from the $8000 company car, it could have
the rational choice given tax rates.

