Gamertell

Canada has become a haven for European game developers who are looking for a tax reprieve.  The tax incentives being offered to game developers in Canada have ensured that the country gets a bigger chunk of the burgeoning videogame business while countries like Britain and France watch the exodus of game developers. Britain has decided that its time to take the war to Canada. And, no, Britain is not going to offer greater relaxation in taxes to the videogame industry, but it will challenge the very legality of the tax incentives on offer in Canada.

The UK Ministry of Culture, Media and Sport has convinced the European Commission to launch an inquest into Canada’s trade practices…

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Video game retailers aren’t too happy with the proposed New Mexico tax law that will levy a 1% surcharge on the sale of video games and TV sets in the state. They have shared their displeasure with Sierra Club, the social organization that has purported the law. According to Sierra Club, the funds will be in turn used to “to fight obesity and poor school performance which may result from excessive… video game exposure.” But in a letter sent by the Entertainments Merchants Association (EMA), a representative body of game retailers, its vice president Sean Bersell countered the very logic behind the tax proposal.

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New Mexico Democrat Gail Chasey is getting set to draw the ire of some of her consumer constituents, according to an Agence France-Presse (AFP) report. The lawmaker announced impending legislation last last week (January 25, 2007) that would levy a one percent tax on video games and televisions sold in the state. According to Chasey, the program will “Improve the academic performances of our kids” and help to fight child obesity.

Money from the fund, which is expected to garner four million dollars each year, will also be used to finance field trips to state parks and other outdoor areas. Chasey, a former educator, intends to use these outdoor classrooms to encourage healthy and active lifestyles for the students and bolster academic performance. The program is titled “No Child Left Inside,” a snarky homage to the current administration’s education policy.

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An increasing number of legislators seem to be gunning after video games - especially when they are short on political agendas - and Wisconsin State Senator Jon Erpenbach is among them. However, Erpenbach has no issues with the sale of violent games to children or the alleged perverting effect of such games on them. All he wants is to levy a nominal, harmless tax on video games to fund a new juvenile justice program.

Erpenbach has authored the new Wisconsin tax bill that proposes to levy a 1% surcharge on the sale of each games and game consoles. The funds will then be used to transfer 17 year old kids, who have been charged with non-violent crimes, to the juvenile system.

Erpenbach estimates the cost to be huge, and it might indeed be huge with state records pointing at 30,000 17-year-old kids being arrested every year and, more importantly, 98% of them are charged with petty offenses.

Jon Erpenbach does have his reasons for singling-out video games for this new tax-for-a-noble-cause bill. Apparently, he feels that since juvenile justice and video games both concern children, the video games industry has an ethical burden of some sort to be the source of funds for the new reforms - the new benchmark of absurdity. This ethical-tax burden should be shouldered by other industries also. Why just the game industry? Kids even watch a lot of movies so why not impose a tax on movies as well.

Read [WISC-TV]

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