On Wed, 31 Dec 2003 07:23:31 -0500, "Arny Krueger"
wrote:

"John Atkinson" wrote in message
om
(Nousaine) wrote in message
...
(John Atkinson) wrote:
It's a subjective judgment on the part of the IRS. Earn $1000 and
deduct $1000 and the IRS will judge it a hobby. Earn $100k and
deduct the same $1k and the IRS will have no problem with it being
a business. The dividing line lies somewhere in the middle. :-)

This is a bit of an oversimplification as well. $100k in gross
receipts is not 'earnings.'

My apologies for confusing you Tom. My statement was meant to be
humorous, hence the smiley.

Tom's still recovering from the OD of accounting he received in business
school. FWIW, I saw the same error.

John. well-written humor that is reality-based should be technically perfect
up until the humorous twist. I take it you either never read Freud or never
believed anything he said?

Unfortunately, both of you are wrong. John never said anything about
"gross receipts". He said "earn". If you earn $100,000 from your
writing, it's about the same thing as earning $100,000 from your
paychecks at work (except that you would be paying your own taxes
directly instead of having them deducted as you go). Sure, it's
"gross" (before taxes) and I guess you could call it "gross receipts",
but that wouldn't invalidate the "reality" portion of his joke. He
used extreme examples to illustrate his point. The IRS wouldn't look
twice at someone who earns $100,000 and takes a $1000 deduction. That
is quite true.

BTW Arnold, you haven't shown much ability to either judge humor *or*
create it.