Belgium To Tax Rewritable CDs

An anonymous reader writes "The Belgian federal government will quietly introduce a tax on rewritable CDs on May 1, the office of the country's minister of economy confirmed. Officially called a "compensation for personal use," the tax will add 12 euro cents (13 cents) per hour to the price of a CD-R. The proceeds are earmarked for composers, copyright holders and performers. Here is the scoop."

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[amorsen]

There is an EU directive forcing all EU members to implement some kind of levy (notice that this is /not/ a tax; taxes go to the government). So far Germany has chosen to keep theirs very low, so that is where I get my CD-R's. It is legal to import CD-R's for personal use to other member countries without paying any extra tax; EU guarantees the free movement of goods within Fortress Europa. There are many webbased shops in Germany that will gladly send all over the EU.

As long as just one member country maintains a low levy, it will be possible to get cheap CD-R's. If all of them raise the levy, we are screwed. It is highly likely that a similar levy will be introduced on hard drives and printers. DVD-R's are a sure target, there /will/ be a levy on them if there is not already one.