How is the taxable value of a goat determined? I was reading an  over on Law.SE, and it made me wonder about how the IRS calculates tax on barter transactions.  Lets say that I do a job in January, and get paid for my work with 20 goats and when I received the payment, goats were worth about $100 each.  Later that year, in October, I do another job of about the same value, but this time I get paid with 5 goats.  The goat market has gone absolutely crazy and they are now worth about $400 a head.  In December, the goat bubble officially popped, and they're down to $20 each.  I didn't earn any goats in December, but this market downturn might be important.  So, for the year, my taxable income was 25 goats.  How would I, or more importantly, how would the IRS allow me to calculate taxes on my earnings?  Would I have to prove the market value of the goat when I received payment?  Can I claim that I only earned 25 * $20 since that's what the goats are worth now?  Note:  Assume that this small income is taxable as if I just made $50k/year.  I realize that with such a small earning taxes wouldn't normally be due and I'd be living in poverty with my goats, but that's not a part of my question.
Does payment in goods count as "income" for tax purposes? Can someone help me elucidate the definition of "income" from a tax perspective? More specifically, if Joe is paid for his work in avocados instead of dollars, then would Joe be exempt from paying any income tax for the year? Or would the value of avocados earned for the year be translated into dollars which would then be considered Joe's annual income? If so, what guidelines would one use to make this translation? (Make the assumption that Joe does not sell the avocados (for dollars) at a later date and either eats them or trades them for other real property)  What if he was paid in gold instead of avocados?
Negative solution to $x^2=2^x$ Just out of curiosity I was trying to solve the equation $x^2=2^x$, initially I thought there would be just the two solutions $x=2$ and $x=4$, but wolfram shows that the two equations intersect at not 2 but 3 locations, the third being a negative value of $x$. The third solution isn't obvious like the other two, so I just have a few questions about the negative solution. Is it rational? is it commonly represented with a greek letter? If it is irrational is there a way to approximate it? Bash - Integer expression expected Apply subsurf modifier to only part of an object How can I apply a modifier only to a part of an object? I want to model a goblet with a pedestal, and if I add a subsurf, the pedestal, of course, gets an unwanted round shape. How can I avoid that? I have tried Googling it, but, to my surprise, found nothing. I'm setting up an Nginx web server and and want to perform load balancing using the round robin method.  This is what I have found thus far:  upstream backend  {    server backend1.example.com;    server backend2.example.com;    server backend3.example.com; }   According to the page they says i need to add the above lines to my nginx.conf file and upload it to server to load balance.  I do not understand what it means by server backend3.example.com;.  How do I setup a backend instance? How to comment lines in rails html.erb files? In the standard PrintDialog there are four values associated with a selected printer: Status, Type, Where, and Comment.  If I know a printer's name, how can I get these values in C# 2.0? Proving that $T^{2} = T$ for a linear operator on $W$ implies that $V = \operatorname{Null} T \oplus \operatorname{Range} T$ I have noticed that guest quarters on the Enterprise D have fruit bowls on their tables.  A prominent instance is the fruit bowl in Berlinghoff Rasmussen's quarters in "".  The first thing that Rasmussen does when Data takes him to his guest quarters is take a piece of fruit and shove it in his pocket.  Who replicates fruit for these fruit bowls before guests arrive?  More generally, who removes unused fruit and tidies quarters after guests leave?  Is there a ship hospitality staff, perhaps including Guinan's wait staff in Ten Forward? Why is propagation of uncertainties quadratic rather than linear? 1) Up until now, during practical work sessions, I always used these formulas for uncertainty propagation:  if $C = A+B$  or  $C = A-B$ $$\Delta C = \Delta A + \Delta B$$ if $C = AB$ or $C = \frac{A}{B}$ $$\frac{\Delta C}{C} = \frac{\Delta A}{A}  + \frac{\Delta B}{B}$$ if $C = A^m$ $$\frac{\Delta C}{C} = |m|\frac{\Delta A}{A}$$   These formulas are derived from the expression for the differential of a function of multiple variables:  if $C = f(A,B)$ $$ dC = \frac{\partial C}{\partial A}dA + \frac{\partial C}{\partial B}dB \Rightarrow \Delta C = \frac{\partial C}{\partial A}\Delta A + \frac{\partial C}{\partial B}\Delta B$$  and I think that makes sense because the value C is just a function of two variables that happen to be measurements.  2) But this morning, I was told that this is wrong and I should actually use these instead:  if $C = A+B$  or  $C = A-B$ $$(\Delta C)^2 = (\Delta A)^2 + (\Delta B)^2$$ if $C = AB$ or $C = \frac{A}{B}$ $$\left(\frac{\Delta C}{C}\right)^2 = \left(\frac{\Delta A}{A}\right)^2  + \left(\frac{\Delta B}{B}\right)^2$$  which are apparently derived from a general formula:  $$(\Delta C)^2  = \left(\frac{\partial C}{\partial x_1}\Delta x_1\right)^2 + \left(\frac{\partial C}{\partial x_2}\Delta x_2\right)^2 +   \hspace{0.3cm}...$$  or   $$\Delta C  = \sqrt{\left(\frac{\partial C}{\partial x_1}\Delta x_1\right)^2 + \left(\frac{\partial C}{\partial x_2}\Delta x_2\right)^2 +   \hspace{0.3cm}...}$$  3) So:   Why is this formula better?  Where does it come from? What does it actually represent? (Do I recognize the shape of a norm in that last formula?)  What is wrong with the formula of the differential?   I'm asking a lot, but the propagation of uncertainty always confused the ship out of me. Interaction with the site on the app should count towards Enthusiast/Fanatic If I do any of the below, which would normally constitute "activity" on any Stack Exchange site (including mobile):   View my profile Vote on any question or comment Visit one or more questions   ...then Stack Exchange considers me to have "visited" the site.  If I do any of the below on the mobile app:   Vote on any question or comment Visit one or more questions   ...then Stack Exchange does not consider me to have visited the site.  If one wants the app to have feature parity with the mobile site, then shouldn't my participation within the app also count towards the Enthusiast/Fanatic badge? If $n = 51! +1$, then find number of primes among $n+1,n+2,\ldots, n+50$ If $n = 51! +1$, Then find no of primes among $n+1,n+2,\ldots, n+50$  Really speaking, I don't have any clue ... What licence is subscriber content provided under 4.0, 3.0 or them all? I'm doing magnification and lens in class currently, and I really don't get why virtual and real images are called what they are.  A virtual image occurs the object is less than the focal length of the lens from the lens, and a real image occurs when an object is further than focal length.  By why virtual and real? What's the difference? You can't touch an image no matter what it's called, because it's just light. Plot electric potential and field First appearance of a predominately black cast in a TV show I was watching MeTV the other day, which is a fantastic station chock-full of old-time TV shows.  In one sitting I saw episodes of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, The Rifleman and Star Trek (TOS).  So it got me thinking...  None of these shows has many (if any) black actors.  And now I'm curious as to which TV show was the first to feature a predominantly black cast.  Anyone know?  I'm thinking back to What's Happening, Good Times, The Jeffersons...  But were there any before then? What are the advantages of a custom ROM over rooted stock? Why only light nuclei are able to undergo nuclear fusion not heavy nuclei? Is it because of the binding energy or the binding energy per nuclei .  I am having trouble with this whole binding energy and nuclear fusion concept. Using round function in QGIS expression? How would one be able to prove mathematically that $1+1 = 2$? Is it possible to prove that $1+1 = 2$? Or rather, how would one prove this algebraically or mathematically? Show that $G$ is cyclic Here is a problem from Herstein.     Let G be a finite abelian group so that the equation $x^n=e$ has at most $n$ solutions in $G$ for every positive integer $n$. Show that $G$ is cyclic.   I will have to basically show that there exists an element $g$ in $G$ having order $o(G)$.   I showed that such an element exists if $o(G)=p_1p_2...p_k$ where $p_i$ are primes. But I could not proceed if $o(G)=p_1^{a_1}p_2^{a_2}$. I feel that if I can prove this I will be able to extend.