Originally Posted by
s10an
Tell me one government that takes 50%+ in tax......
Originally Posted by
Typhoonpilot
Sweden
Typhoonpilot
Not quite when it comes to income taxes anymore but almost. Until late 80's the marginal rate could hit upward 90% and the Swedish government was embarrassed numerous times when famous Swedes elected to move to the US, the UK, Monaco, Switzerland, Germany, France, and other countries to avoid the ridiculous taxation rates. Amongst the “tax evaders” as they were called by the very leftist media, were Bjorn Borg, Ingrid Bergman (the movie director who just passed away), the IKEA founder Ingvar Kamprad, all singers in the group ABBA, etc, etc. Bergman for example lived in his “tax-exile” as he called it for 9+ years.
One of the most embarrassing moments for the Social-Democrat government (similar to Democrats in the US and Labour in the UK) was when the Swedish children’s book author – Astrid Lindgren ("Pippi Longstocking" anyone?) received an award for one of her books worth some $90,000 and had to pay more than $100,000 in taxes! You read correctly – she was taxed more than 100% on her “profit.” Due to the public uproar, the tax authorities retracted the judgment against her and eventually, in the late 80’s there was a tax reform where the income taxes were lowered to “no more than 50%” however taxes on everything else were raised significantly.
The income taxes have been creeping up again, however the tax rates usually do not exceed 50%. Of course, that’s just the income tax. VAT alone (better known as sales tax in the US) is 25%. When talking about taxation rate, the best comparison rate is the overall taxation rate of the total GDP and in that arena, you guessed it right, Sweden is the leader!
Chart
Remembr that part of their package is an awsome retirement fund, 4 weeks vacation, 12 hollydays and an excellent healthcare system. o yeah, the college for your kids is almost free .
Don’t count on an “excellent healthcare system” in countries with “socialized health care” – after an accident where my mother broke her hip she had to wait almost two years for a surgery to get it fixed permanently. In the meantime, she had two small temporary metal brackets poking out of her body while she was [
memorize this term] "waiting in line" for the “real” surgery. She’s hurting like hell when it got cold, and hurting even more when she bumped into something, not to mention the holes she had to cut out in every article of clothing for the two years. Of course she couldn't work with the pieces of metal poking out of her so she had to stay home during this time. But hey, the surgery was “free,” right? Of course, I realize that you'll find bad of health care examples on both sides of the pond.
As far as European airlines and their benefits – in my view they’re going through their version of de-regulation where EU forbids the national governments to keep subsidizing the local airlines. I think the next 5-10 years you’ll see numerous mergers, buyouts and bankruptcies in EU markets. Sabena, and Swissair was just the beginning; Air France buyout of KLM just an image of the future. Lots of the benefits you see now will become a distant memory akin to the PanAm and Eastern era in the US.
Of course I am often wrong but hey, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it!
