The Unwanted Tourist and other incomprehensable stuff

What about people who don't use the Internet or TV? Shouldn't a book tax be imposed instead of a TV tax?

 

Shhhhhhhhhhhhh! Don't give them any ideas.

 

Once again, the sliding scale of justice is applied to your own professional athletes, so someone in the US also thinks it is appropriate at times. How can uttering a slur cost $100,000 USD? If that was widely applied, there'd be a lot more homeless people wandering the streets.

It's silly to argue about the TV tax. It's merely the historical method used to fund public service TV which is free from advertising , and the amount is a trifle. Yes, you could argue it could be included in the ordinary national level tax, in which case we wouldn't even be having the discussion. The reason it's not, and the decision to actually apply it across the entire population (made only relatively recently) are due to history, and changing demographics (gasp, virtually everyone has a TV!). So how is your NASA TV or the Pentagon Channel funded?

I don't use the armed forces, yet my taxes pay for their continued existence in foreign countries, in spite of reduced effectiveness and a reduction in security here at home. There's miles upon miles of roads I don't use, yet my taxes pay not only for their repair, but also the costs of snow removal. There are many services provided by various levels of Government (National, State, Municipal) that you pay for, regardless of whether you use them or not. There's no point banging on the Finns merely because they've got a tax which shows you directly what it is used for.

 

Fining athletes is done by the private company they work for.

I find a TV tax particularly obnoxious since it is used to fund a government propaganda organ. We do something similar in the US, giving taxpayer grants to PBS and NPR. If it was up to me, they wouldn't get a dime.

 

You can take my PBS from my cold, dead hands!

(except for Kodiak who might just try)

 

I was unaware that the NBA(National Basketball Association) was a Court of Law...

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting which operates NPR(radio) & PBS(TV) gets, on the average, about $3(us) from each US taxpayer per year - quite a measly amount compared to the 50-140 Euros Finland is charging it's taxpayers...Public Broadcasting in the States is mostly financed by corporate sponsorships and public donation drives, federal monies account for only about 17% of it's operating budget(NPR 2% & PBS 15%).

 

I listen to NPR regularly, because it's the only local station that has blues. I just don't think NPR and PBS should get any taxpayer money, at all, ever, because both are basically 24 hour propaganda organs for the left. I would say the same thing if FOX was getting taxpayer stipends. Taxpayers shouldn't be forced to fund propaganda for either side.

 

I can't speak for NPR as I don't listen to it, or any radio for that matter, but compared to what PBS offers in programming, broadcast TV delivers mostly twaddle. As with all things, the 'propaganda' (i guess you mean Newshour, Frontline, Charlie Rose) I can simply change the channel like any intelligent person.

 

Car Talk, You Bet Your Garden, Skytalk, and American Routes are all Leftist propaganda organs???

 

Although, I wish NPR did not bury the most of their BBC broadcasts during the midnight - 6AM block.

 

I agree that PBS and NPR offer some good programming in between the leftist blather. As a matter of principle, I just don't think taxpayer dollars should support it.

If I couldn't listen to my blues program on Saturdays, I'd sure miss it. But then, I'd likely write them a check if they weren't already sucking up my tax dollars. As long as they are, they'll get no donations from me.

 

I don't think anyone said they were. Someone in the US still feels fines based on income is appropriate.

 

Actually, I don't think it is income based. The owner of the Mavericks is billionaire Mark Cuban, and he only gets $100,000 fines for similar confrontations. So far he has racked up 19 of them. Not only that but the NBA will fine $100,000 to individuals, usually owners, who make "unauthorized public comments." So, it would be rather hard to prove that these fines are income-based.

 

Are they enforced to the same extent though?

That would make things simpler. Are you saying though that cities, towns, and villages, have no control over say speed limits or zoneing?
Speed limits is a good one to examine in more detail. Does one typically get a ticket for say exceeding the speed limit by 10 km/hr? How about 5 km/hr? or 1km/hr? Is this enforced completely uniformly over Finnish roads?

You made the assertion you should be able to prove it. Just because someone feels like making abserd (or not) assertions doesn't mean that if challenged it's up to the rest of us to disprove it.

 

Perhaps he should, but not at the moment though. That was still not the point, neither is the fact that some of our laws (too) might seem odd at first. The point was, that I don't know of any current laws in Finland which are not supposed to be obeyd.

Only those punishments have a sliding scale according to income which are punished by fines, also outside traffic. Minor traffic offences (e.g. speeding up to 20 km/h above the limit) have fixed penalties.

Cell phones are not the only options. There are all kinds of pads and laptops with all kind of screen sizes too. Very much the same ballpark then.

 

Naturally there could be an option not to tax tv-usage at all. The tax was generated at the time when tv was luxury. Before that there was a radio tax. In Finland - as well as in many other countries - there's a state owned radio and tv company (YLE) which takes care of the public services not provided by private broadcasting companies.

YLE needs to be funded somehow. The tv-tax is one possibility.

The books have a tax too - the VAT.

The modern society does not work if everybody only pays those taxes which benefit him/her straight away. There're always going to be taxes without immediate return.

 

Creating a program for 5,4 million people does not cost less than making it for 310 million. Do the maths...

 

Propaganda...?

Without YLE there would be no local news for Swedish or Sami speakers - nor for deafs nor Russian speakers. There would be no (or very little) drama or series in tv in Finnish language. Only sports in tv would be ice-hockey, rally and Formula 1. There would be very few Finnish made documentaries in tv, and so on and so on.

You got the picture...?

 

Don't know, since I'm not a police officer. Would not try my luck though.

The cities etc. have control over limits/zones, but not over laws nor penalties.

Normally exceeding the limit by 10 km/h gives you a ticket, closely under that a warning. Normally one would not be stopped for exceeding the limit by 5 km/h.

The police tries to enforce the laws uniformly over the hole country, but naturally it might vary a bit.

For the last time: one cannot "prove" something which does not exist. If you don't get it I'm sorry (for you).

 

If you can't "prove" something then isn't it a bit of a reach to state that it is absolutly true? Especially when your last statements pretty clearly bring the statement to question.