Tax Resistance News from Spain

Some bits and pieces from here and there:

  • The campaign to get people and institutions in Catalonia to redirect their Spanish federal taxes to the Catalan regional government continues to pick up steam. About a dozen companies and a dozen more municipalities are participating in the redirection campaign, and they were recently joined by three members of congress: Alfred Bosch, Joan Tardà, and Teresa Jordà. The campaign seems to be largely symbolic, as the current policy of the Catalan tax office is just to re-redirect such taxes back to the federal treasury. This also means that the federal government has not felt any urgent need to take reprisals against the redirectors. I get the feeling the redirecters hope to change this policy, and hope that when they do, people will already be in the habit of sending their taxes to the regional agency.
  • The IRS snafu, in which some agency personnel improperly gave extra scrutiny to TEA Party groups that had filed for recognition as non-electioneering 501(c)4 “social welfare” groups, has turned public opinion strongly against the tax agency.
  • If you’d like to catch up on the interesting autonomist tax resistance movement in Spain, and its “Offices of Economic Disobedience”, and you’re up on your español, you might take a listen to Barrio Canino’s Radio Ágora Sol show.

I got another letter from the IRS a few days back. It was the usual “Notice of intent to levy” letter sent in an intended-to-be-frightening certified mail format (meaning I had to sign for it). It lists the amount I declined to pay for ’s taxes, along with a $21.91 failure-to-pay penalty and $7.62 in interest.

This was accompanied by several paragraphs encouraging me to pay up, telling me what they might do if I neglect to do so, and explaining the interest and penalties. Also in the envelope was a Publication 594 (“The IRS Collection Process”) and a Notice 1219‒B (“Notice of Potential Third Party Contact” — that is, a warning that they might talk to “other persons, such as a neighbor, bank, employer or employees” in the course of trying to track down me and my assets).

Nothing much different here than from years past.