🔌 The First to Tax!

The Bad Boys are now causing trouble in Vietnam! 🤦‍♂️ 

Seems like Netflix and Apple (Apple TV) have not paid a single dime in taxes despite having a combined revenue of $43.15M (which is equivalent to one trillion dongs) from almost a million subscribers. Also, Netflix has been in trouble with the Vietnamese government for having obscene content.

🔌 The First to Tax!

The new tax in town is the unique levy on Electric Vehicles! 🙉 While countries around the world are gifting tax breaks to buyers of EV, South Australia decided to slap a tax instead. And yes, you’re right. It has already received enough criticism.

🏭 A ‘big tax’ on ‘not-polluting’ the environment? Maybe not! The recent budget proposed that the government would spend $18M on EV charging stations.⚡ It’s predicted that this tax would raise approx $1M in the 1st year. But given there are probably little more than 2K EVs in the state (there were 412 EV sales in the state in 2019), that translates into a tax of nearly $500 per vehicle in its first year. So it is more of a ‘road-user’ and ‘setting-up’ tax.

⛽ Because they don’t BURN any fuel, EV users can easily dodge fuel excise. But a recent analysis by EY shows that every driver who switches to an electric vehicle delivers a $1,370 boost to government coffers, and an $8,763 boost to the Australian economy. Also, the revenue that goes into fuel excise is not spent on roads. It goes to general tax revenue. EVs buyers pay enough taxes owing to the higher cost of the cars – meaning more GST, more stamp duty, and more luxury tax.

🤝 A uniform tax might be what everybody will be looking forward to. Under the South Australian rule, hybrid cars with very low fuel consumption escape both the road tax and the bulk of fuel excise costs. Just like Europe and Japan, South Australia has a target of zero net carbon emission by 2050.

Will this tax hit pause on the goals keeping in mind only 50 EVs🚗 have been sold in SA so far?

👇Ah, and also this

💁‍♂️ “We told ya” – Gucci to Rish The United Kingdom’s treasury department wipes out ‘duty-free’ shopping for tourists. And the store retailers and AOA (the voice of UK airports) are so fit to be tied. 11 brands have called on for the knock-on impact of the change. These include Loreal, Gucci, Tiffany, Hugo Boss, Samsonite, and others. It is estimated that this law could lead to 138,000 job losses, cost the economy almost £3.5B, £6B fall in retail sales as tourists might end up shopping ‘elsewhere’ and the airports would go deep in the red! 

🛒 The Passport is on sale! And Eric Schmidt plans on buying it. Who’s Eric Schmidt? He’s the former CEO of Google and plans to become a citizen of Cyprus (Europe’s island country). Now, there are two important things. First, Billionaires are increasingly maximizing their freedoms and finances by relying on the permissive laws of countries where they do not live. 

Second, financially struggling countries, have embraced the idea of raking money in exchange for citizenship papers. Cyprus is particular is the notorious one.

🍂 #TaxSeason2020

🚀 We have received tons of requests for a webinar on Tax filing for Traders. So here it is! 📹 In this webinar Vishvajit Sonagara (founder at Quicko) introduces Quicko and walks you through the process to File your ITR with Trading Income.

🧐 Need Help Filing Taxes? Sit back, relax & let an expert file your taxes with the ‘Expert Assisted Tax Filing’ in 3 EASY STEPS:

✅ Choose Right Plan

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♠ Tax the Ace – Crazy Tax Story

First things first, what’s absolutely astounding about the tax on playing cards is that – it started in the 15th century and was revoked only in 1960!

The Death Card. The addiction proved to be an easy source of income generation for the English government. Each manufacturer had its own ‘mark’ and would hand stamp their mark on the Ace of Spades to show that it was a legit version. In 1828, the stamp practice was replaced with officially printed Aces of Spades. These cards were printed on behalf of the Commissioners of Stamps by the Perkins Bacon company.

The tax was 12 times the price of the cheapest cards produced and 1.5 times that of the best. King James of England and Scotland dramatically raised the taxes in the year 1710. When this card was placed inside the deck, it meant that the manufacturing company had paid the reduced shillings (from 30 pence it was reduced to 12 pence). Those Aces were known as the ‘Old Frizzle’ and actually looked pretty similar to a banknote.

In 1960 the tax was revoked but the custom of decorating the Aces of Spades remained and this is why, even today, the Ace of Spades is the prettiest card in the deck.

💭 Byte of the Day