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European Commission To Raise Camera Costs in Europe

Posted by Zonk on from the maybe-they-should-start-making-cameras dept.

An anonymous reader writes "According to a recent CNET article, digital camera costs could increase in Europe as result of trade inequalities. 'At the moment, all digital cameras are manufactured outside Europe. They're all imported. All of them. Currently, there's a European Commission-imposed 4.9 per cent import tariff on camcorders, but not on cameras, whatever their video-recording abilities. The EC's Nomenclature Committee has cottoned on to this and wants to slap a tax on cameras that can record at least 30 minutes of video in one go, with a resolution of 800x600 pixels or higher at 23 frames per second or higher. The Nomenclature Committee has recommended the proposal but has not, as yet, garnered the required majority vote.'" Update: 07/23 02:18 GMT by Z : Took out a bit of hyperbole.

9 of 300 comments (clear)

  1. Phones? by The+Living+Fractal · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So does this affect phones? Slapping arbitrary technical specs on something might later on bleed over into emerging technologies. Hell, I think my phone is almost capable of that... It's not, but it can't be long before your average phone is... So, what's the plans for that?

    TLF

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    I do not respond to cowards. Especially anonymous ones.
    1. Re:Phones? by networkBoy · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Same issue when boarding an airplane.
      My video camera is subject to inspection, but my camera is not, even though it can record every bit as well as the "video" camera, which incidentally can record stills too.
      -nB

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  2. Go the protectionism by QuantumG · · Score: 4, Funny

    Cause if there are people in China who are willing to work for cheaper than people in your country then you best make sure business and consumers can't benefit from that.

    --
    How we know is more important than what we know.
    1. Re:Go the protectionism by QuantumG · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Personally, I'm for outsourcing of software development too.. probably because I'm in Australia and that's one of the places that US companies outsource to :)

      --
      How we know is more important than what we know.
    2. Re:Go the protectionism by 1stworld · · Score: 5, Insightful

      With protectionism, Europe still doesn't build cameras, the rich man pays $15 plus higher taxes for the unemployed working man who can't afford the camera. Without protectionism, Germany sells the precision instruments to produce the optics, Japan designs the semiconductors, Taiwan fabs the chips and the Chinese assemble them with equipment bought from the West. Everyone benefits, is employed and makes enough money to buy a $10 camera. That's reality. Anything else is fiction and ignores how the global economy works.

  3. Well that's clearly a winning plan by tietokone-olmi · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I foresee special "EU edition" cameras with the video recording function switched off in firmware so it won't qualify for the tariff. Of course manufacturers will "forget" certain cheat codes in the firmware that will permanently enable said functionality. These codes will of course be mysteriously "leaked" to the internet.

  4. The world's going to end over a 4.9% tax? by joe_cot · · Score: 4, Funny

    To put this in perspective for anyone who's not doing the math, this means the cost of a $500 camera has now increased by *gasp* 25 dollars. You pay far more tax than that when you buy a new car.

  5. trade by falconwolf · · Score: 4, Insightful

    In the case of tariffs, the EU is attempting to encourage local manufacturing and reduce trade imbalances

    If the EU rally wanted to correct for a trade imbalance then what they need to do is get rid of the 100s of billions of euros in subsidies given to European farmers. Because of these subsidies food grown in Europe can be exported to third world nations and sold there retail for less than farmers there can grow food. That's a big reason the WTO meeting in Geneva fell apart in the summer of 2006. India walked out because first world nations, the EU, Japan, and the US wouldn't cut farm subsidies. India has literally thousands of farmers committing suicide because they can't compeat with farmers who collect hugh subsidies. Slashing US farm subsidies to $13 billion a year is "unacceptable," a Bush administration official said on Wednesday. All these tariffs are is protectionism.

    whereas airline "security" is not about making flying safer, but about social engineering, making people more accepting of micro-management from a nanny state, and introducing the perception of safety even though everyone knows that it won't do a lick of good.

    Yeap, our overseer lords want us all to believe the only way to keep safe is by having a nanny state. What they're really doing is a power grab, they want to tell people how to live, and if the people won't then force them to live the way they say.

    Falcon
    --
    Should there be a Law?
    1. Re:trade by Corporate+Troll · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Not saying that it isn't true, but the (predecessor of the) EU was founded on a "never war and never hunger again" idea. So this means we need to keep our food production locally. Dependence for food on other nations is a big no-no. That said, I don't agree that they export the heavily subsidized stuff. They should just produce less, and that's often what happens: farmers are paid not to plant stuff. Overproduction is just as bad as underproduction...

      Alas, many people have forgotten the original idea of the EU.