benefit of "legal tender" bullion?

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CleverNickname

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I feel like I don't fully understand the implications of what it means to own eagles vs. private market buillon. From what I gather the benefits of owning AEs are:
  • easily recognizable, not obscure private mint
  • higher penalty for counterfeiting means possibly more certainty in purity/weight
  • could use in IRA (but since I gather you can't store your IRA at home, less useful to me)
but what does it mean actually be "legal tender" in terms of various laws or legal scenarios?
 
I thought that there were tax benefits when selling ASE's vs private mint options. I probably read that here, but can't remember where to find it. Someone else will probably know.
 
I feel like I don't fully understand the implications of what it means to own eagles vs. private market buillon. From what I gather the benefits of owning AEs are:
  • easily recognizable, not obscure private mint
  • higher penalty for counterfeiting means possibly more certainty in purity/weight
  • could use in IRA (but since I gather you can't store your IRA at home, less useful to me)
but what does it mean actually be "legal tender" in terms of various laws or legal scenarios?

To be legal tender means it is real and actual money with a "face value" as determined by the mint. For Eagles, the tender is one dollar. This means if you go to a bank, they are obligated to give you one fiat dollar for each Eagle. In reality, no one would ever do this, but the implications would seem to be that the government couldn't call them bullion, so they couldn't easily confiscate tehm since they themselves circulated the "coins" as legal tender US money. In theory, this makes it very safe silver to own, but in practice, it remains to be seen........:popcorn:
 
I read somewhere you could use it as a loophole to avoid paying high taxes.
For example:
(Silver is 30 dollars an ounce in this story)
Lets say I own a store and am selling an ATV or a riding lawn mower for three thousand dollars. And three thousand dollars plus tax is 3,300. But you show up with 100 Silver eagles. I, the owner of the store,give you a discount for being a preferred customer. And sell it to you for 100 dollars plus tax. You give me 100 Silver eagles plus 10 dollars. The owner of the store gives the 10 dollars to the goverment and you paid 290 dollars less than if you used fiat money.
Or your employer could pay you in American Silver Eagle Dollars. Maybe you only made 1500 dollars last year and you qualify for food stamps.

Anybody else ever heard of this?
 
I read somewhere you could use it as a loophole to avoid paying high taxes.
For example:
(Silver is 30 dollars an ounce in this story)
Lets say I own a store and am selling an ATV or a riding lawn mower for three thousand dollars. And three thousand dollars plus tax is 3,300. But you show up with 100 Silver eagles. I, the owner of the store,give you a discount for being a preferred customer. And sell it to you for 100 dollars plus tax. You give me 100 Silver eagles plus 10 dollars. The owner of the store gives the 10 dollars to the goverment and you paid 290 dollars less than if you used fiat money.
Or your employer could pay you in American Silver Eagle Dollars. Maybe you only made 1500 dollars last year and you qualify for food stamps.

Anybody else ever heard of this?

This is definitely possible;:

Half pay in ASEs:
http://articles.boston.com/2012-02-09/news/31042755_1_silver-coins-paper-dollars-silver-dollars

Major deal (in my opinion):
www.wethepeoplefoundation.org/UPDATE/Update2007-09-30.htm
Las Vegas employer found not guilty of any charges stemming from his paying of employees with gold and silver U.S. coins that were also legal tender.

:cheers:
 
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