BC Province Income Tax: HST Tax Payer
by admin
Comments Off on Why BC Provincial Income Tax Rate Cut to Can’t Save HST
Why BC Provincial Income Tax Rate Cut to Can’t Save HST
On October 29, 2010 BC Premier Gordon Campbell in a Television Advertisement announced 15% Provincial Income Tax Rate cut on an income up to $72,000, starting January 1, 2011.
Underlying assumption is this income tax rate cut will give people more money in hand to cover the cost of HST.
How much money people will be saving?
“Immediate savings of $354 for people making $50,000/year and up to $616 for those making $72,293 or more.”
Let’s do the math here. If you are making $50,000 this tax cut will save you 0.7% of your income and if you are making $72,293 you will be saving 0.85% of your income. As far as I am concerned, this tax savings is insignificant. People making over $50,000 do not care about saving 354/year.
People who would benefit from this will still pay 100% of HST. Over 80% of BC residents make less than $30,000 per year. How much savings are they going to get with this income tax rate cut? Is this tax savings going to cover the HST impact on their expenses?
Bottom line, HST is good for business and the province and Income Tax Rate Cut is a welcome relief. But HST is still going to hurt consumers. Now its time for businesses to stand up and announce the savings they are transferring to consumers.
HST Real Estate: Canada CRA HST Tax Tax Rate
by admin
Comments Off on Home Buyers Are Ignorant about HST in British Columbia and Ontario
Home Buyers Are Ignorant about HST in British Columbia and Ontario
I wrote about this myths about HST is causing a havoc in real estate market where HST was introduced in July 2009.
Home buyers are ignorant about HST and also real estate experts have failed to send the message about the net effect of HST to the prospective home buyers.
A recent study confirms my conclusion about HST and Real Estate market.
Grant: Tax Rate
by admin
Comments Off on Smart People Making Stupid Decisions (Tax, that is!)
Smart People Making Stupid Decisions (Tax, that is!)
Soda pop is making us fat/obese. Yes! That is the conclusion of an expert panel, selected by the Canadian Heart and Stroke foundation.
The experts are also indirectly saying Coke/Pepsi and all other sugared drink is cause of our Heart Attacks and Strokes.
What is the solution the expert panel recommended?
TAX everything that poor can afford to buy, starting with soda pop, fast food, processed food. Their assumption is by shifting the price point of unhealthy food, people will start to eat healthy food.
Why not look it the other way? Bring down the price of healthy food. Lets make it in par with junk food. That was not in the recommendation.
This TAX approach has been tried in many places and has proven to be ineffective.
Imposing a TAX on products does not shift buying behavior. Sometime it encourages to consume more by the buyers to show the vanity they can afford to buy an expensive item.
Example… Price of Gas. Gas is being taxed to the extreme and whenever the city or province needs money, they add a new TAX on gas. Did it discourage driving? Just few weeks ago, a report came out, the Canadian Car Companied are having record breaking sales.
To stop Obesity and create healthy nations with strong heart, we need to target the root underline cause.
People are buying unhealthy food, because that is what they can afford. Price of heart healthy food is out of reach to most people. People buying so called junk food probably does not have a steady source of income or job.
This is how we need to tackle Canada’s obesity problem.
1. Educate people about healthy food and junk food and let them decide without being forced to a decision.
2. Put as many options out there for physical activity as possible
3. Create jobs to put more money in the pockets of poor people
4. Bring down the price of healthy food and drinks (don’t see this point raised by any experts).
Canada Revenue Agency Income Tax: CRA investment
by admin
Comments Off on Annual Report of Taxpayers Ombudsman
Annual Report of Taxpayers Ombudsman
Taxpayer’s Ombudsman created little over 2 years ago to provide and independent and impartial review of individual taxpayer complaints as well as addresses any widespread service-related issue at the CRA.
As a Canadian Taxpayer if you feel like you are being mistreated by the CRA, you can take your complain to Taxpayer’s Ombudsman.
On behalf of Taxpayers, the Ombudsman will take the complaint to CRA and ask for an investigation. In some cases the result of investigation might be favourable to the taxpayer.
The Ombudsman has filed its second annual report of annual activities on October 7, 2010. The report details the cases they have intervened on behalf of the taxpayers.
You can download the annual report here.
Income Tax Tax Fraud: Tax Fraud US Tax
by admin
Comments Off on UBS Betrayed its Customers in Tax Case
UBS Betrayed its Customers in Tax Case
Zurich based UBS the largest Swiss bank, acquired customers from all over the world, on the promise that their information would be protected and kept secret. The U.S. Justice Department filed a criminal case against UBS AG, that the bank conspired to defraud the U.S. by helping 17,000 Americans to evade taxes hiding money from the Internal Revenue Service.
To avoid prosecution, UBS broke the veil of Swiss bank secrecy to its loyal customers and admitted to the charges by U.S. Justice Department. UBS paid US$780 million, admitted helping tax evasion from 2000 to 2007 and handed over data on more than 250 U.S. clients. UBS later turned over information on additional 4,450 US account holders.
UBS signed an agreement with the prosecutors to end its cross-border business and co-operate with the U.S. government and identify the American account holders. With this agreement UBS avoided the prosecution and U.S. dropped the criminal case against UBS.
This agreement raises a serious question about the loyalty of corporations to its customers. Swiss banks are known for the protection of their customer’s information. If they fail to perform their duty to their customers, should the customers bring legal action against the corporation?
The Bank do not have the information if taxes were paid or not on the deposit of account holders. Out of 17,000 US account holder, I wonder how the bank decided to turn over selected account for tax evasion to the U.S. government.