Today, an international tax resistance round-up:
- Greece
- Tinos Today brings us a flashback to a tax resistance campaign that happened there in . It didn’t seem to have ended well for the resisters: sixteen leaders were tried under martial law and given prison terms, and the local Bishop fled to Russia.
- Iceland
- Citizens of Iceland are required to register their religious affiliation with the government, which then doles out tax money proportionally to the various denominations. Thousands of citizens who are fed up with this government subsidy of religion are flocking to a newly-revived ancient Sumerian religion, Zuism, whose officials promise to refund all of their subsidy to the members of its church.
- India
- The Times of India story describes it as a “threatened” tax strike, but quotes in the article suggest that the strike has already begun. Residents of Jaivishwabharti Colony in Aurangabad have decided to withhold property tax in protest against the government’s failure to provide basic municipal services.
- Mexico
- Residents of Uruapan have started withholding municipal taxes and using the money to fund private Neighborhood Watch groups, in exasperation at the inability of law enforcement to protect them from criminals. Resisters are also refusing to pay certain utility rates.
- Russia
- A new tax on truckers in Russia has led to a strike that is unsettling the Putin regime.
- South Africa
- President Zuma abruptly fired his finance minister, whom many saw as the only person willing to apply brakes to Zuma’s profligate and corrupt spending. Investor confidence in the South African markets, debt, and currency took a big hit, and South African taxpayers began to consider cutting off Zuma at the source. The Opposition to Urban Tolling Alliance, which had spearheaded an earlier campaign against road tolls, immediately announced that it was considering a broader tax revolt, but judging from how many people are tweeting tax refusal vows along with their #ZumaMustFall hashtags, the organization had better hurry if it wants to be at the head of the parade.
- Spain
- War tax resisters in Bilbao took to the military barracks to hang up signs denouncing military spending, including a ten-foot-tall human silhouette cutout labeled “890€” which is the amount the group estimates each person in Spain is forced to spend on the military annually. “This enormous amount of money comes from our taxes,” one explained, “so every year in Bilbao we open our tax resistance office where we give people the opportunity to disobey this injustice, refusing the payment of part of their taxes that are devoted to military spending and redirecting them to social ends.”
- United States
- Louis J. Adler didn’t like how he was treated at the Oregon Department of Revenue, so he set loose a flock of chickens in their office.
