Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave It Alone

Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by tptacek on Monday June 07, 2010 @12:43PM (#1410993)

The government is going to screw up the delicate system of venture funding how, by eliminating the loophole that allows them to dodge taxes on the carry income they earn for managing other people's money?

I know there's multiple things on the table that could impact VCs (onerous reporting requirements for small investments among them), but it's hard to judge them when the valley (Arrington clearly among them) is so obviously militant about retaining bogus tax loopholes.

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by hga on Monday June 07, 2010 @01:10PM (#1411066)

Strawman: Arrington specifically referenced Dodd's insane regulations + net worth increase in the latter's financial regulation bill, which most certain would have screwed things up. As it is, the current compromise of excluding an angel's primary home from his calculated net worth is going to remove a lot of angels from the game.

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by tptacek on Monday June 07, 2010 @01:18PM (#1411085)

I'm referencing Arrington's comments on Feld's blog.

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by hga on Monday June 07, 2010 @01:19PM (#1411087)

Could you supply a link (doesn't have to be to the exact comment)?

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by tptacek on Monday June 07, 2010 @01:20PM (#1411093)

Google "VC carry interest". Feld's blog post owns the search results page for it.

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by hga on Monday June 07, 2010 @01:36PM (#1411138)

The first page of my Google results doesn't even have a link to his blog.

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by gojomo on Monday June 07, 2010 @02:46PM (#1411365)

My top 100 for [VC carry interest] include no Feld links, either. Perhaps TPtacek is seeing highly personalized Google results?

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by tptacek on Monday June 07, 2010 @02:50PM (#1411384)

Sorry, add "tax" to your query. But if it doesn't come up this time, I'm sure you can find Feld's post yourself.

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by hga on Monday June 07, 2010 @03:43PM (#1411613)

Still no luck, and since it is you who is claiming that Arrington is referring to the carried interest tax hike proposal "screw[ing] up the delicate system of venture funding" (something not evident in his comment on Fred Wilson's blog noted by gojomo), it is incumbent upon you to specifically support it rather than sending us on a wild goose chase.

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by gojomo on Monday June 07, 2010 @03:29PM (#1411550)

You must mean Fred Wilson, because this post meets your description (including an Arrington comment), while no feld.com posts do:

http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2010/05/why-taxing-carried-interest-...

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by tptacek on Monday June 07, 2010 @03:43PM (#1411614)

Crap, sorry.

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by danthony on Monday June 07, 2010 @05:25PM (#1411978)

VentureBeat made a valid point that an earlier version of the Senate's financial reform bill created a big problem for venture-funded startups, by requiring an SEC filing and associated 120 day waiting period for all companies seeking funding. http://venturebeat.com/2010/03/26/angel-investing-chris-dodd...

However, this language was removed during the floor amendment process, but Arrington doesn't mention that small example of the state acting sensibly (the Senate, no less--which is arguably the most dysfunctional institution in the whole apparatus.) http://www.techjournalsouth.com/2010/05/senate-approves-fina...

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Re:Here’s How The Government Can Fix Silicon Valley: Leave I... by hga on Monday June 07, 2010 @08:24PM (#1412564)

That's one sentence in a wide ranging essay on policy and he properly qualified it with "that could have".

It's hardly "acting sensibly" when something that would have devastated angel funding was even on the table, let alone that it took a major effort to mostly fix it with a comprise that will remove a bunch of angels from the game.

It well supports his thesis and especially his preceeding sentence: "Our government is just way too interested in mucking around in Silicon Valley by creating and enforcing rules based on little or no understanding of the consequences."

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