Some recent links from here and there:
- Brayton & Suzanne Belote Shanley of the Agape Community are interviewed at NWTRCC’s blog about their war tax resistance and the intentional community they cofounded with war tax resistance at its core.
- Vendors in Pakistan are ramping up their anti-tax protest after a brief shut-down strike with new street protests.
- Venetian separatists are again refusing to pay taxes to Italy, paying their federal taxes instead to “Veneto State”.
- Some 17,000 taxpayers in Catalonia also are paying their federal taxes to the Catalan tax agency rather than the Spanish one, in acts of civil disobedience.
- There’s a tax strike underway in Beni, North Kivu to protest the failure of the government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to provide security in the region.
- More roadside traffic ticket generating speed cameras have been attacked in recent weeks, in South Arica and France. Spain has moved on to using drones instead.
- There’s not a lot of meat on the bones here, but Andrew Leahey connects the dots and shows how Trump’s contempt for paying his own taxes and his undermining of the prestige of government are likely to undermine “tax morale” in the United States with long-term consequences for how willing traditionally sheepish American taxpayers are to cough up their tribute.
- Researchers into the impact of the government “shutdown” last Winter found
that it landed
blows against
IRS
workers in the community they studied.
Of the furloughed workers surveyed, more than 35% missed a rent or mortgage payment, 30% went to a food pantry, 72% experienced mental health issues, 42% wanted to make a career change and 65% were very or somewhat concerned about their finances post-shutdown.
In the open-ended response portion of the survey, an employee wrote, “We are U.S.A. citizens that have families to support. Often we hear we deserve it, because we work for IRS. We are doing a job that is dictated by Congress. It is surprising how people seem to want others to hurt. It is sort of sickening.”
Another employee described going back to work during tax season: “With a month of catch up at my busiest season, it is so stressful. This is the first time in 15 years I am exhausted after work and do not want to go in the mornings. That was never the case before.”
