Mapp's Five Year Plan..

OH yea I JUST posted this on that other thread lol. Yikes, people are gunna be so pissed.

I guess the Chinese aren't coming to the rescue after all.
Thank goodness!

I guess the Chinese aren't coming to the rescue after all.

They never were in the first place.

I can take just about anything but more tax on beer!!!!!! Off with his head!

AandA2VI
Ruh Ro...
Heres the five year plan...

Among the proposed new taxes are measures that would increase the price on a 2-liter bottle of Coke by a dollar, on a bottle of Heineken by 50 cents, and on a carton of cigarettes by $20.

Additional proposals in the financial plan for increasing revenues includes:

• A new 10 percent excise tax on rum, wines and brandies upon entry into the territory.

• Increasing the Marine Terminal User Tax – which cruise ship passengers pay – from $1 per person to $5 per person beginning in Fiscal Year 2019

• A new 5 percent internet gross receipts tax. The tax would apply to items Virgin Islands residents purchase over the internet from sellers who are not located in the territory, like Amazon.

• A $20 per carton “sin tax” on cigarettes, which amounts to an additional $2 per pack.

• A U.S. and foreign beer tax that would increase the tax on domestic beer brought into the territory by $10 peer case, which amounts to 42 cents per bottle, and on foreign beer by $12 per case, or 50 cents per bottle.

• A “sugar tax” of one and a half cents per ounce on carbonated beverages.

• A Fuel tax. The plan call for recapturing the 14 cents per gallon fuel tax.

• Two property tax initiatives. Review tax credits and raise property tax floor to $360, inclusive of tax credits.

• Expiring Economic Development Commission benefits. Companies with expiring EDC benefits would start paying corporate and gross receipts taxes.

To add insult to injury, the Mapp administration Austerity measures includes:
• The executive branch wants to include “limiting budgeted vacancies” for personnel. (In other words, have justification for not hiring 1000 new employees as promised.)

• The executive branch also wants to start charging the public a charge-back fee for paying for government services with a credit or debit card. (In other words, they want V.I. residents to walk around with cash in one of the World’s highest crime rate location or pay a fee for trying to ensure your safety by not carrying cash.)
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Glad I'm moving.
We're going to hell in a hand basket.

Let's not reduce wasteful government spending.
Let's raise fees and taxes on an already overburdened population.
The cruise ship tourists will just wait to make their cigarette and liquor purchases in St. Marrten, our biggest competition in the Caribbean aside from Cuba.

Meanwhile, we're still paying for Mapp's luxury lifestyle and a whole lot more, besides.

Hopefully these proposal s will not pass. Seems everything the government want to do is aimed at pushing tourists and locsls out of the territory

Well this makes me want to think twice about moving there.
Please keep us on the forum updated on these ridiculous measures.

Hot those sails STXSAILOR!
Heineken is like $4 a case on SABA.
Bless their little Dutch hearts.

Let's go singlefin. We can do a Smokey and the Bandit run. You got a fast boat to be my blocker?

Hopefully these proposal s will not pass. Seems everything the government want to do is aimed at pushing tourists and locals out of the territory

Yeah, that'll work. Then the amount of services to provide should go down so they won't need as much money to run the government:S

• A new 5 percent internet gross receipts tax. The tax would apply to items Virgin Islands residents purchase over the internet from sellers who are not located in the territory, like Amazon.

I wonder how their going to implement that?

• A new 5 percent internet gross receipts tax. The tax would apply to items Virgin Islands residents purchase over the internet from sellers who are not located in the territory, like Amazon.

I wonder how their going to implement that?

They can't. Federal law allows municipalities to collect a SALES tax. We don't have one.
A GROSS RECEIPTS TAX (as you know) is on gross income received by a business licensed to operate withing the VI.

These people have no grasp of LAW.

All Amazon has to do is say NO, and it's done. And then the AG will sue and lose.

• A new 5 percent internet gross receipts tax. The tax would apply to items Virgin Islands residents purchase over the internet from sellers who are not located in the territory, like Amazon.

I wonder how their going to implement that?

Simple, just like income tax. All the good residents of VI send in a new form and voluntarily report how much you ordered on-line for the past year along with the tax payment:D That's basically how it works in the states. I guess they figure every penny they get was one they wouldn't have gotten otherwise.

Simple, just like income tax. All the good residents of VI send in a new form and voluntarily report how much you ordered on-line for the past year along with the tax payment:D That's basically how it works in the states. I guess they figure every penny they get was one they wouldn't have gotten otherwise.

OK, I get it. Just like the form we voluntarily submit for Excise Taxes when we pick up a commercial shipment from the Post Office. Nudge,nudge. Wink, wink.

They are on the fast road
[

quote=speee1dy]
Hopefully these proposal s will not pass. Seems everything the government want to do is aimed at pushing tourists and locals out of the territory

Yeah, that'll work. Then the amount of services to provide should go down so they won't need as much money to run the government:S

AandA2VI
Ruh Ro...

• The executive branch also wants to start charging the public a charge-back fee for paying for government services with a credit or debit card. (In other words, they want V.I. residents to walk around with cash in one of the World’s highest crime rate location or pay a fee for trying to ensure your safety by not carrying cash.)
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Glad I'm moving.
We're going to hell in a hand basket.

Wow, part of me thinks I should be really discouraged from moving to the VI when I read this, especially because others have posted similarly dire predictions about the future of the VI too. But somehow I'm not discouraged, I guess because I live in Las Vegas which (supposedly) has been "going to hell" in one way or another, for as long as I've lived here (several decades). It amazes me how long my town has been going to hell without ever having gotten there, lol. So I gotta figure it's maybe at least possible that the VI will somehow continue to avoid hell for decades more as well. And to a large extent, I think that heaven or hell is in the eyes of the beholder, too...

When I recently read (just for kicks) online reviews on Las Vegas (my own town) on 'Sperlings Best Places' I was stunned at how negative, no contemptuous the reviews were, to the point where I felt compelled to write a review of my own, just so that people would have a more balanced review to take into consideration. I'm not saying I don't appreciate you all sharing the negative aspects of island life, I do... it's shattered my rose-colored glasses, and that's probably a good thing. But today I spoke with a woman living and working in STX who relocated from the mainland 6 years ago... still loves loves it there, and I must say that gave us a much needed injection of hope!

Question: does anyone know of an online source where I can fact-check whether or not the VI has "one of the world's highest crime rates?" I've heard this mentioned by more than just a few, so I'm not disputing it, I'd just like to see the official numbers for myself, per capita, in comparison to the mainland and the rest of the world. I have heard some say they believe the official numbers have been tampered with or down-played to preserve tourism, but be that as it may I'd like to see the numbers anyway.

Crime rate in Las Vegas is high, yet in all my many years here (knock wood) I've never been mugged. I would not hesitate (at all) to carry cash in my wallet, unless walking downtown at night alone (which I would never do). Would be interested in hearing if others on the islands feel unsafe carrying cash around in their day to day lives.

Thanks!

• A new 5 percent internet gross receipts tax. The tax would apply to items Virgin Islands residents purchase over the internet from sellers who are not located in the territory, like Amazon.

I wonder how their going to implement that?

Simple, just like income tax. All the good residents of VI send in a new form and voluntarily report how much you ordered on-line for the past year along with the tax payment:D That's basically how it works in the states. I guess they figure every penny they get was one they wouldn't have gotten otherwise.

I would never do that.

There have been links in the past. Might be the fbi?

Our murder rate has been the highest in the past. And it seems to be on track thus year too. Sadly

.

In FL, large online retailers charge sales tax to customers and it is added as you the customer pay for your merchandise. In particular, if there is any type of physical presence in FL, the sales tax is collected. Small out of state merchants may not collect but legally they are obliged to do this.

State by state rules on (sales and/or gross receipts) tax collection differ in their contractual relationships between government entities and online retailers.

There already is an algorithm for tax collection.

• A new 5 percent internet gross receipts tax. The tax would apply to items Virgin Islands residents purchase over the internet from sellers who are not located in the territory, like Amazon.

I wonder how their going to implement that?

Simple, just like income tax. All the good residents of VI send in a new form and voluntarily report how much you ordered on-line for the past year along with the tax payment:D That's basically how it works in the states. I guess they figure every penny they get was one they wouldn't have gotten otherwise.

Yes, but Fed law refers to a SALES TAX.

We do not have a sales tax. Any decent lawyer would be able to defeat the requirement.

http://marketplacefairness.org/what-is-the-marketplace-fairness-act/

Side note: We are not a state so it does not apply to us anyway. So there is no way the VI can collect a SALES TAX from Amazon, etc. And they can't collect a GROSS RECEIPTS TAX either since the businesses are not licensed in the VI.

Delaware and New Mexico both have GRTs that function similar to sales taxes.

Delaware and New Mexico both have GRTs that function similar to sales taxes.

I didn't know that. Thank you.

Amazon does not collect tax from those states, but I don't know about others. I use Amazon as a benchmark only since they are the largest single on line retailer.