TAXATION IN ITALY

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 44, 21 February 1930, Page 4

TAXATION IN ITALY

"PAYING TILL IT HURTS"

REMARKABLE IMPOSTS

An official-looking gentleman, flanked by two assistants, entered the office in Koine. He wanted to know whether he should, remove a desk, a typewriter/ or a rug". It developed, Carroll Binder writes'in a Rome dispatch to the New York "Sun,".that "I had made myself liable for a fine by failing to pay a licence tax for the right to operate an office. I had visited three taxeollection offices and paid fees at each, but this one had escaped me. My predecessor had paid the licence fee for the fiscal vyear. ■ He had paid the tax for an office, the tax for an office with"-a rug on thq floor (which made it a deluxe office), the tax for a sign on the building, and the tax for a sign in a foreign language, but he didn't know about the personal licence tax, nor, of course, did I. Other taxing bodies send a solicitor with a bill. The Rome licence taxers simply sent an agent to confiscate some object worth as much as or more, than the ' four dollars due "

For in Italy, we learn, the taxpayer pays until it hurts, says the "Literary Digest." Iwenty-two per cent, of the individual's" income is paid in taxes, Mr. Binder tells us, and the Italian shares with the /Englishman the distinction of paying the. largest proportion of his .income to the Government—which should be comforting news to Americans sore from the payment of income taxes. Continuing his account of the fee he forgot to pay, Mr. Binder says:

f "On being .assured of my intention to pay,' the agent., agreed toiremove nothing, but I. could not prevail-upon him to accept .payment of the fine and tax. It was necessary for me to call in'person, because I was born after 1892.' It was a question, of establishing. my 'ability to ' read and write as well as paying the money. The argument that a. journalist might be presumed to be literate was brushed aside as irrelevant. So I took my place in a queue, and after an hour passed the test —by writing my name. "Our taxes are relatively few, as we transact no business in Italy. A professional man gets hit harder and more frequently. A young dentist friend must pay nine distinct taxes to as many different offices. Some of them are quarterly, some semi-annual, some annual. The total averages about £9 a month (a formidable item for a European professional, man), and the payment requires many hours' attention monthly."

Tax complications of course increase in proportion to the number of interests of a citizen: The "Corriere Mercantile," one of Italy's best financial journals, published at Genoa, has compiled a list of the taxes which a Genoese bachelor business man has to wrestle-with every year. Here is the bill, as Mr.' Binder itemises it:— 1. National land tax". • 2. Provincial laud tax. 3. Communal land tax. . 4. Gross income tax with supplementary taxes on portions of income derived from business and portion from investment. 5. Bachelor tax. This fluctuates annually with age and income of payer. 6. Supertaxes on both income and wealth —paid separately from normal income tax. 7. Communal tax on his business. 8. Communal tax on profession (often exercised jointly in Italy with business). 9. Corporation tax for Fascist corporations. < 30. Social insurance tax. "11. Highway-maintenance tax—one for home, one for business. 12. Highway-occupation tax—based on frontage of home and business property on highway. ■ 13. v Weights and measure tax. 14. Sign tax. 15. Tax for provincial councils economy. 16. Tax on rent paid. t 17. Licence for conduct of any kind of business, trade, or profession. 18. Tax for each vehicle owned (a 30----horse power Italian car, for example, costs about £20 a year in taxes). 19. Tax for each animal owned. 20. Tax for grilles at cashiers' or other windows. 21. Tax for each doorway or entrance from street to home, office, or factory.' 22. Aqueduct tax. Inasmuch as many of the taxing bodies do not send notices of the amounts due, or the time when these must be paid, the mere payment of these imposts is a formidable task. Schedules of tlates when payments must be made and the-amounts due must be kept by trusted clerks.' In addition, the Italian employer must inform the Government Registry Office of the number of employees on his pay-roll as well as their ages and social condition— that is, whether they have been married during the year. Under the concordat with the Catholic Church, priests are exempted from taxes; | but few other citizens escape. [