ask them why Christianity in America is such a failure . . .

after their head explodes and they calm down , reply :

” would a “Christian Nation” allow it’s citizens to sleep on the street while our “law-givers” promote tax breaks for yachts and jets for those who have much ? “

—0—Never Mind .

don’t expect a bunch of sympathy for people who can afford to pay a few thousand more for a boat they don’t need.

A boat/yacht for a sailmaker IS a necessity, the same as car dealers need cars, jet ski dealers need jet skis and so on. My business puts food on 6 family’s tables year round, 10 seasonly, supplies Kaiser healthcare, and a roof over their heads, and I am proud. I can provide custom, quality work, successfully, a rarity in a time when most sail lofts are moving out of the country.

I paid sales tax on my boat, although it would have been easy to take delivery elsewhere and avoid both the sales tax and the use tax. The law that lapsed rolled back a 12 month window to 3 months for out of state deliveries of boats/yachts for in state use. The state should enforce the use tax and the sales tax for slackers who do the out of state delivery scam – but you know what? I don’t think there are many ‘yachties’ who actually do that very expensive route.

My guess is that cars and airplanes make up the bulk of the tax scammers. Somewhere between $5-21 million tax dollars are purportedly lost, on a gross of $1-2 billion. Here is a list of sales and use tax delinquents in California in 2007. Notice how many car dealerships scam their sales/use taxes.

My point is (and was at 240) that knocking boaters/yachties as loophole deadbeats looks stupid in the face of the facts: it is more the land ‘yachts’ (cars) that are killing our state budget as opposed to boats. However, changing the window for all three – cars, boats, and planes will only be a drop in the bucket compared to the projected (at this point in time) $16 billion dollar deficit. My suggestions for real budget relief are up at 240.

The tax battle over yachts and private airplanes has been fought for years and we’ve had this loophole eliminated only to see it revived. When you buy a yacht in California, as when you buy all sorts of other items here, you pay a sales tax. If you buy it outside California and bring it into the state, you pay a “use” tax—effectively the same as a sales tax. There was a requirement that those who purchase these vehicles out of state could not bring them into the state within 12 months or this use tax would have to be paid. This provision expired June 30, 2007 and the period of time was reduced to just three months.

The 12 month period was to discourage tax avoidance on expensive purchases such as yachts through offshore delivery arrangements in which delivery takes place outside the state’s waters and the yacht is berthed for a few months in Mexico or another location outside of the state. For these, the saving from tax avoidance can be tens of thousands of dollars, easily outweighing the additional transaction costs of keeping it out of state.

The Legislative Analyst’s Office found in a detailed 2006 report that the law had resulted in a sharp decline in out of state usage exemptions and an increase in in-state taxable sales. The LAO also found little evidence of any change in the sales of yachts and the like. The LAO recommended that the 12 month period be made permanent

link

Hey, CTuttle! And oldtree, it’s a confused Schwartzenegger we’ve got. Pissing off the republicans quite a bit these days!

Has Arnold apologized to Gray Davis yet?

How about getting back all the money Enron took?

Remember that during this Bush administration there was an energy attack on California, terrorists in New York, Pennsylvania (perhaps) and D.C., anthrax in D.C. and Florida and the press says he’s protecting us.

No one said any such thing. Every republicans voted to keep a loophole in legislation that would keep folks from paying sales tax on those items. Every dem voted to close the loophole.