Then, I guess the difference was this is a tax on declared dividends, while the levy was a tax just for operating in Jamaica? It was a fixed figure and had nothing to do with profits made or moneys being sent back to the home country.
The levy itself was quite proper...the way Manley did it was not. Too arbitrary/hasty and the greedy companies reacted with outrage. Back then they thought we should tek what we got.
Dunno, but there is precedent for dividends...everybody else used to pay. It is ordinary investment income.
If they dont want to pay, they can pay stock dividends, issue bonues shares, do stock acquisitions or just plough back profits into building the business.
Yeah they should pay some tax, but 33% seem high to me, especially coming from nothing (which it should never have been). When the govt tax policies on investment instruments are always changing dramatically it discourages long term investments as you never know what to expect in say 5 years.
But I know you will say these are extraordinary times, so...extraordinary measures are needed.
There is another side to this coin.
I've been railing for years against the fact that Scotiabank in particular has turned Jamaica into an ATM. While I can understand providing tax incentives for sectors that govt wants to develop for reasons of industrial policy... banking is not currently a sector needing that assistance.
This dividend income would be taxed somewhere.. if not at source in Jamaica, then almost certainly in Canada, Scotiabank's domicile. The rate in Canada is whatever it is... lower or higher than Jamaica.
Recognizing the victims of Jamaica's horrendous criminality and exposing the Dummies like Dippy supporting criminals by their deeds.. or their silence.
I'm just taking a second look at the documentary " The Corporation". Not a very flattering view of large corporations...and ironically made long before the current crisis created by nothing more than greed.
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