Sunday, August 19, 2012
Wealthy Italians Take Tax Lesson From John Kerry
NPR, Italian Yacht Owners Weigh Anchor to Dodge Taxes:
Italy has a public debt of nearly 2 trillion euros, and it's cracking down on its notoriously wily tax evaders. Owners of luxury yachts are a prime target, with tax police launching dockside raids to see how individual tax files line up with owning and maintaining an expensive boat. ...
But yachts are mobile assets. In response, many boat owners are simply weighing anchor and setting course for more tax-friendly Mediterranean marinas. ...
Since the tax crackdown was announced in March, around 30,000 boats have fled Italy, seeking safer havens. They include Slovenia, Croatia and Montenegro to the east, France and Spain to the west, and Tunisia and Malta to the south.
The Italian association of marinas says the yacht exodus has cost the Italian economy some $350 million this year in lost revenues from marina fees and services, and fuel sales. Tax authorities are unrepentant, saying it's important to strike fear in the hears of tax dodgers.
Prior TaxProf Blog posts:
- Sen. John Kerry Skips Town on Sails Tax (July 23, 2010)
- Sen. Kerry Sails Around the Tax Issue (July 27, 2010)
- Sen. Kerry Abandons (Tax-Dodge) Ship, Agrees to Pay $500k MA Tax on Yacht (July 28, 2010)
- Sen. Kerry & Yacht-Gate: Learned Hand's Perspective (July 29, 2010)
https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2012/08/wealthy-italians.html
Comments
BJ tried the yacht tax too and it exploded in his cigar jar forn he & his bureaucrat buffoons. The left & thie clueless apparatchiks are simply too stupid to grasp the reality of the Laffer Curve.
Raise taxes,revenues crash, lower taxes revenues explode. Class warfare taxation is an eternal delusion of the left's statists demagogues.
Posted by: Observer | Aug 19, 2012 9:57:15 AM
I have not been able to find any report that John Kerry ever paid the promised taxes on his yacht...just like he never released his promised military medical records.
Posted by: Woody | Aug 19, 2012 8:21:28 AM
«Tax authorities are unrepentant, saying it's important to strike fear in the hears of tax dodgers»
Heh. The politics of envy, not of maximizing revenue.
One of the first things Mario Monti did when came on board late last year is put in a crazy yacht tax, which got repealed/modified less than two months after it went into effect.
As you see, even the updated version of envy is causing job losses and net tax revenue losses.
This is too funny. And to think that Monti is considered some sort of technocratic whiz kid by the Eurocrats. But he is no better at economics than any old Soviet commissar. Which is what he and his ilk are, of course.
A failing command and control government economy in Italy? Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of Italian lefties!
Posted by: Francisco Moreno | Aug 19, 2012 6:20:33 AM
Sounds like NOT too many are scared.Do kinda feel sorry for all those marina folks who wont have to dodge paying their taxes though.
Posted by: Rich K | Aug 19, 2012 11:53:36 AM