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Florida Proposes Taxing Local LANs
Vellmont writes "From the state that brought you the 2000 presidential election debacle, now comes the proposal to tax your LAN. The Orlando Business Journal is reporting that the the state of Florida is thinking about putting a 9% tax on LANs within the state. Exactly what they will be taxing isn't clear, since the tax amounts to 9% of... something. Will taxing the electrical wires within your home be next?"
This ranks right up there with Minnesota regulating VOIP like a normal telephone service.
Why the hell do law makers seem to think that every new technology needs to regulated to hell, or treated like some form of existing technology??? The internet LIVES the way it does today because it happened so damn fast than lawmakers couldn't keep up...
A substitue comm system? They must have needed a catch all to ensure they could screw every penny of tax of everything out there. Would this cover two tin cans with a string between them? I'd hate to see that go to court, I'm sure they'd rule it taxable.
I can understand the need for a 'tax' on very much public infrastructures like a massive telephone land line system or cable systems... but why would you need to tax someone extra for laying out 4 pair wire? Do in house telephone systems get covered? Do you have to have a certain type of equipment to 'qualify'?
There are some amazingly difficult terminology problems for them to define:
Because it is easier than cutting spending.
Why? Because they can and it makes them feel important.
Don't mean to be redundant, but there's a very good (not good good, but "explains things" good) reason they do: they're paid to do so.
Minnesota imposed VoIP regulations to protect the incumbant carriers. ILECs are aggressive at lobbying and throw a lot of money around during election time. (After all, they've got to spend some of that money the fleeced you on your business line somewhere).
Florida's proposal is bizarre. Granted, the ILEC tax model is old, though they're still finding creative ways to pump back money to the old boy network like re-inventing the rural telephone fund to tax broadband service and give the money back to ILECs in exchange for their promise to think about rural customers occasionally. (In an odd twist, our company which provides service to half a state in fly-over-country, would be taxed in order to give the money to ILECs who don't offer broadband! Go figure...). But this Florida one even has me puzzled. It's as loopy as use tax (sales tax for sales that a state does not have legal jurisdiction for, and then creates a tax on using products, but exempts you if you paid in-state sales tax, meaning the only people that pay use tax are interstate purchases which didn't pay sales tax. How's that for simple?)
Since nobody wants to cut budgets in state gubmints, it makes you wonder what's next. Don't be surprised if we see:
- a simple "per-foot" tax on cable. We'll have to have 14-page exemption forms for farmers who have long rural distances to run between the barn and the house, of course.
- a MIPS tax, socking it to the rich suckers who can afford that top-of-the-line processor (sort of a PC SUV tax)
- CPU cycle credits: download and run GUBMINT.EXE in the background, allowing the state's tax computers to load share when your PC is idle, and get a $25 annual rebate on your LAN tax. (Of courses, the state will hire consultants from Intuit to write spyware that measures your LAN length and other taxable details and reports back thru the exe program).
Come on, public servants. Certainly you can find more creative ways to part us from our hard-earned money while you play solitare all day at the DMV!
*scoove*