Love, laughter and lonely clouds have inspired poets the world over. Now Taiwan wants people to find lyrical inspiration in a subject that is also close to the heart — taxes.
The Ministry of Finance has launched a competition for Taiwanese to write verse about initiatives aimed at making it easier to file taxes. Topics include such gems as the uniform invoice redemption app, the Taxpayer Rights Protection Act (納稅者權利保護法) and tax refunds on energy-saving appliances and the replacement of used vehicles.
The competition has inspired budding bards — and humorists — to channel the likes of William Carlos Williams on Twitter.
To be sure, taxes have inspired plenty of lyrics in the past.
“The tax man’s taken all my dough, and left me in my stately home,” the Kinks sang in Sunny Afternoon.
Thomas Jefferson also was not a fan, according to the hit musical Hamilton: “Look, when Britain taxed our tea, we got frisky. Imagine what gon’ happen when you try to tax our whisky.”
The UK’s former poet laureate Carol Ann Duffy penned 22 Reasons for the Bedroom Tax in 2013.
Taiwan said the poems must be no more than 10 lines in length and must be submitted in Chinese and English. Only Taiwanese citizens can enter, and the winner is to be announced at the end of August, receiving NT$18,000 in cash.
However, a tax collector will be coming to take back some of that money — it must be declared as income when filing next year.
One reason for the competition could be Taiwan’s relatively flat tax revenues since 2018, even as the economy boomed from surging global demand for semiconductors.
Tax revenue was equal to 12.1 percent of Taiwan’s GDP in 2020, ministry data showed.
That is significantly lower than most other developed economies, and less than the global average of 14.9 percent, World Bank data showed.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
The first bluefin tuna of the season, brought to shore in Pingtung County and weighing 190kg, was yesterday auctioned for NT$10,600 (US$333.5) per kilogram, setting a record high for the local market. The auction was held at the fish market in Donggang Fishing Harbor, where the Siaoliouciou Island-registered fishing vessel Fu Yu Ching No. 2 delivered the “Pingtung First Tuna” it had caught for bidding. Bidding was intense, and the tuna was ultimately jointly purchased by a local restaurant and a local company for NT$10,600 per kilogram — NT$300 ,more than last year — for a total of NT$2.014 million. The 67-year-old skipper
BREACH OF CONTRACT: The bus operators would seek compensation and have demanded that the manufacturer replace the chips with ones that meet regulations Two bus operators found to be using buses with China-made chips are to demand that the original manufacturers replace the systems and provide compensation for breach of contract, the Veterans Affairs Council said yesterday. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Michelle Lin (林楚茵) yesterday said that Da Nan Bus Co and Shin-Shin Bus Co Ltd have fielded a total of 82 buses that are using Chinese chips. The bus models were made by Tron-E, while the systems provider was CYE Electronics, Lin said. Lin alleged that the buses were using chips manufactured by Huawei subsidiary HiSilicon Co, which presents a national security risk if the
RSS