6 ms·
Reminds me of when lawyers successfully argued that X-Men are not human, so that their action figures would be classified as "toys" rather than "dolls" and thus
by halgir 2y ago
Reminds me of when lawyers successfully argued that X-Men are not human, so that their action figures would be classified as "toys" rather than "dolls" and thus charged a lower tariff.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toy_Biz%2C_Inc._v._United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toy_Biz%2C_Inc._v._United_Stat...
- huhtenberg 2y agoThere's also Converse that adds a piece of cloth to the soles of their sneakers to be able to classify them as slippers for "taxation purposes". https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/this-is-why-your-converse-sneakers-have-felt-on-the-bottom-6016648/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/this-is-why-your-c...
- Y_Y 2y agoSnuggies are "used" and not "worn" in their promotional materials, because it's better to be taxed as a blanket than a garment. https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2017/02/snuggies-are-blankets-not-garments-for-tax-purposes.html https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2017/02/snuggies-ar...
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- breakingcups 2y agoWonder if you could either sue them for delivering an insufficient product (it does not function as a slipper under the definition for longer than a day after walking) or keep returning them under warranty.
- Pawka 2y agoSounds insane. But what is more surprising to me - is why dolls were taxed differently than other toys. At first glance, it looks like stupid rules force to play silly games.
- liontwist 2y agoThis. It’s a pretty reasonable answer to a stupid question. Dolls depict people.
- soco 2y agoSome trade war from the XIX century or something? Or maybe because dolls were historically thought for girls?
- RobotToaster 2y agoPossibly, bisque and china dolls were often imported from Germany.
- shortrounddev2 2y agoProbably lobbying from a local doll maker
- pkphilip 2y agoIn India, the pizza base has a different tax rate than the topping and so some restaurants will have two separate lines on your pizza bill - one for the base at 5% tax and another for the topping at 18% tax. The tax on popcorn is also totally crazy. "Unpackaged and unlabelled popcorn with salt and spices is categorised as 'namkeen' and taxed at 5%. Pre-packed and labelled ready-to-eat popcorn attracts a 12% GST rate. Caramelized popcorn with added sugar is taxed at a higher rate of 18%."
- K0balt 2y agoOr my shirt that has a tiny, useless pocket on the inside of my shirt (down where it might often be tucked inside of your waistband.) It has a tag with a picture of sunglasses on it, and a reasonably sized pair of sunglasses might just tenuously perch inside. This makes it a jacket, and jackets are taxed at a lower rate than shirts. The same shenanigans more or less work for most types of taxation. There’s always an angle to reduce or even eliminate taxes, unless you work on salary or for wages. It’s clear who the system is built for lol.
- redox99 2y agoWhy would jackets even be taxed differently than shirts. It's so silly.
- lazide 2y agoFreezing to death is worse than looking nice?
- ramses0 2y ago5% of a $100 jacket is $5 15% of a $33 shirt is $5 5% of a $33 jacket is $1.65 ...it's definitely gamesmanship but if you squint you can see where it comes from.
- sharpshadow 2y agoThis reminds me of maybe the worst tax in human history which is also unconstitutional. The Pauschalabgabe[0] in Germany, which also got adopted in other countries, implements a freely decidable flatrate tax on all mediums which can be used to create a pirated copy. How much tax for a laser printer? Well it depends how fast it prints: Up to 14 pages/Minute: 25,00 € Up to 39 pages/Minute: 50,00 € From 40 pages/Minute: 87,50 € For every storage medium this tax has been paid, because of the possibility of making a pirated copy. Technically we all paid already to make pirates copies. 0. https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauschalabgabe https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauschalabgabe
- 2y ago
- rsynnott 2y agoThis sort of thing happens relatively often; Sony also tried (unsuccessfully) to have the PS2 deemed a personal computer (which would have lead to 0 tariffs in the EU): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yabasic#PlayStation_2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yabasic#PlayStation_2
- theshrike79 2y agoIIRC the PS3 Linux option existed because of this same tariff.
- ToucanLoucan 2y agoI often wonder what the ROI is on this. How much did Sony have to pay engineers to implement this interesting but seemingly pretty useless functionality vs. what it actually saved them in the aforementioned tariffs? I know the knee jerk reaction is to say it obviously saved them some money or they wouldn't have done it, but I've seen far too much corporate stupidity in my life to take that as a given. I'd love to see the data.
- PetitPrince 2y agoMaybe it was just a passion project for the engineers or even Ken Kutaragi ? See also Net Yarose, Linux For Playstation 2, Other OS & Yellow Dog Linux for Playstation 3.
- spookie 2y agoFor sure, they had very interesting architectures. Used even in supercomputers as a number of them in parallel
- rsynnott 2y agoWell, in the end it didn't save them anything, because the EC didn't accept that having a toy basic interpreter made what was obviously a games console a PC. I can't imagine it was terribly expensive in the scheme of things, though.
- tommica 2y agoWhich is fucking hilarious when you think that a lot of xmen storyline is about them wanting to be perceived as humans
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- rickdeckard 2y agoWhich legally probably also makes it a fairy tale "It's a nice story and the court won't prevent you from telling it, but legally these beings in that story are clearly NOT humans" Hilarious.
- marcosdumay 2y agoAnd also, they are an "on your face" depiction of the dehumanization of the Holocaust victims...
- recursive 2y agoPretty much fits. It probably wouldn't be such an issue if they were just human.
- MasterScrat 2y agoThanks, amazing story! I found this nice coverage of the events: https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/92007/why-us-federal-court-ruled-marvels-x-men-arent-humans https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/92007/why-us-federal-cou...
- lmm 2y agoSounds like Ford putting seats in the back of their vans so they could pay less tax when importing them from Mexico, then removing them before they're sold. Looks like they've now been fined, but they got away with it for a while.
- whaleofatw2022 2y agoTechnically the ones they got in hot water for were from EU to get around the Chicken Tax.
- mauvehaus 2y agoThis was also the reason for the (in)famous BRAT seats: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subaru_BRAT https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subaru_BRAT
- Ntrails 2y agoA bunch of fun articles around these areas in the UK (free to read, think you might need an account though - apologies). Two food and one toy: https://www.ft.com/content/5af5b182-349a-4a25-b4fb-4551908f2b3f https://www.ft.com/content/5af5b182-349a-4a25-b4fb-4551908f2... https://www.ft.com/content/a6a54008-6059-4052-99ae-282f148f24e0 https://www.ft.com/content/a6a54008-6059-4052-99ae-282f148f2... https://www.ft.com/content/a8d6413e-1184-4f89-9bcb-4f6cb8d7aad4 https://www.ft.com/content/a8d6413e-1184-4f89-9bcb-4f6cb8d7a...
- walthamstow 2y agoFT Alphaville is such an excellent column
- magicalhippo 2y agoOr when the makers of Jaffa Cakes baked a giant 12 inch version[1] and brought it to the court to argue they were cakes and not biscuits to get lower VAT. [1]: https://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2015/10/time-company-baked-giant-cake-win-court-case/ https://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2015/10/time-compan...
- op00to 2y agoI would eat that.
- petepete 2y agoI wish supermarkets would put them on the cake aisle instead and keep the biscuit aisle pure.
- klondike_klive 2y agoThat's a mass protest I could get behind
- fennecbutt 2y agoMost UK bikkies are meh, though. I have to import ones from NZ here to survive. Mallowpuffs are so much better than tea cakes. Squiggles, Tim tams, chit chats, sultana pasties, griffins macaroons, toffee pops, hundreds and thousands, mint slice. Whereas here it's mostly shortbread or bourbons/custard creams.
- meitham 2y agoThe tax system is over complicated! Why the distinction between toys and dolls?
- willcipriano 2y agoRegulatory capture most likely
- mousetree 2y agoThe Doll Industrial Complex
- steveBK123 2y agoWhen Trump set a tariff on German optics because he was mad at Germany, Leica had a workaround as well. Most of their equipment is made in Portugal and finished in Germany, with whatever WTO agreed % of value added that allows them to stamp "Made In Germany" on the goods. So for US markets they issues a series of lenses that were more fully finished in the Portuguese factory such that they could be stamped "Made In Portugal".
- panosfilianos 2y agoI wonder if there is any place where one can look up all these sort of creative legal-tax shenanigan stories. They are so fun and such an interesting lens to see what _is_ via this interlinked, case-specific web of events.
- mandibles 2y agoThe book is called Daylight Robbery: How Tax Shaped Our Past and Will Change Our Future https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43805741-daylight-robbery https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43805741-daylight-robber...
- walthamstow 2y agoHoo boy we have some classics in that category in the UK. My personal fave is when morning TV host Lorraine Kelly successfully argued she wasn’t hosting as herself but acting a character called Lorraine Kelly, with very favourable tax consequences.
- Corrado 2y agoI think Steven Colbert hosted a show using himself as the host. I’m not sure about the tax implications though.
- technothrasher 2y agoI'm pretty sure that was Chuck Noblet pretending to be Steven Colbert.
- DFHippie 2y agoIf there were any tax implications, they were incidental. The show was parody, so the opinions he espoused in character were necessarily ones he didn't actually hold.
- gwbas1c 2y agoAnd then when he tried using the "Steven Colbert" character on a different show, Comedy Central threatened him because Steven Colbert does not have rights to the "Steven Colbert" character.
- bloomingkales 2y agoThat doesn’t seem like that should be possible. He sold his identity for life? Hollywood really does ask for your soul huh. It would make sense why he’s never even jokingly gone back into that character on his new show.
- treis 2y agoIt's not his identity, though. It's a character that he plays.
- moomin 2y agoIn universe, arguing the X-Men are not human would put you firmly in the villain category.
- woodrowbarlow 2y agoexactly, that was core to the whole plot; oppressed mutants fighting to have their basic human rights recognized.
- TeMPOraL 2y agoSo it turns out that the final boss denying mutants their humanity are... the tax authorities.
- JBiserkov 2y agoCapitalists? in the villain category? Impossible!
- reverendsteveii 2y agoThis has interesting implications for the Marvel canon, as the conflict between average humans and mutants is a primary plot driver for x-men
- RobotToaster 2y agoWas their lawyer William Stryker?
- autoexec 2y ago> Reminds me of when lawyers successfully argued that X-Men are not human Isn't that true though?