Voted for: Earnings? What earnings?
Steemit doesn't pay anyone The US$'s
so there are no earnings from Steemit.
STEEM is a crypto-currency and the Infernal Revenue Syndicate categorized them as a commodity.
Thus, if i sell it for The US$'s i would then have to report income and expenses.
This would be the amount of US$'s that i acquired minus all the expenses in making blog posts such as office, having internet connection, phone, computer...
If the Infernal Revenue Syndicate changes crypto-currency's classification to a money, then they will have to accept STEEM as payment. Else, it would be like them charging you for all the money you got out of a box of monopoly.
But, it will probably be what they try to do, and it will fail hugely.
Since crypto merchant acceptance is getting high you could technically manage to never convert STEEM to fiat.
It is why the Infernal Revolting Syndicate will try to reclassify it as a money, but in so doing they will open a new can of worms which will put them in a bind.
However, although everything i said is the letter of the law, the Infernal Revolting Syndicate has never followed the law. They make it up as they go along.
Further, to explain to everyone who may read this,
if you file a 1040 claiming income from cryptos, it doesn't matter what the law says, you just said, under penalty of perjury, that you earned money from cryptos.