At 18:04 22-5-01 -0500, Dan Minette wrote:
> > Excuse me. But at once raising taxes to a standard that we have here in
> >Europe isn't what anybody suggested.
>
>Actually _I_ suggested Europe like fuel taxes being phased in. Remember I
>do favor strong conservation measures. I just don't think they come without
>a price.
I don't believe you'll see Europe-like fuel taxes in the US any time soon.
Raising taxes is, after all, a form of goverment intervention, and
Americans have a reputation for hating that. Raising fuel taxes to European
levels would cause mayhem and disaster. The population would probably riot
by the time fuel taxes were half as high as they are in Europe. By the time
you reach 75% of the European level, prepare for civil war...
> >Besides companies get the most part of their taxes paid on fuel back.
>
>Care to cite a source on that? I don't know what is done in Europe but that
>as far as I know that is a false statement for the US.
I believe Sonja is referring to the Dutch approach. We have a 19% VAT on
goods. When a company buys goods, and thus pays VAT, the Tax Service will
reimburse them. When a company sells goods, and thus receives VAT, they
have to pay the VAT received to the Tax Service. This doesn't mean there
are two continuous flows of money, though. Once every quarter, every
company has to make a simple calculation: VAT received minus VAT paid. The
difference is then settled with the Tax Service.
>"Since the oil crisis in the 1970's, taxes on car fuels here have gone up
>dramatically (IIRC, some 90% of the price of fuel is taxes nowadays). No
>hardworking Dutchman has gone bankrupt because of it. A few years ago, the
>government put an "ecotax" on energy. This lead to higher energy bills, but
>no hardworking Dutchman has gone bankrupt because of it"
>
>The insinuation that I took is that the owner/operator truck drivers who are
>having trouble coping with the price of fuel now and those that would have
>trouble with the fuel taxes in the future are just not working hard enough.
>Please read the worlds I wrote.
I never said that those drivers weren't working hard enough. I only said
that raising taxes hasn't caused hardworking people to go bankrupt. I
realize we have high taxes here, especially compared to the US, but taxes
are increased gradually -- fuel taxes didn't go from <however low they
were> to the ~90% they are now, overnight.
>Plus, I've regularly seen anger from you and Jeroen concerning things
>American. Insulting food, culture, working habits, etc. Why are y'all so
>angry?
We (Europeans) aren't angry. It's just that all the US-glorification is
getting tiresome.
>But, speaking of working hours it is a fact that the average American
>salaried worker puts in more hours of unpaid overtime than the averaged
>salaried worker in any European country. Its a fact that the average
>vacation length is shorter.
Overtime is usually paid, and vacation length is longer. We owe all that to
our socialist/social-democratic background, and decades of fighting for
workers' rights by trade unions.
The amount of overtime, and it being paid or not, depends on the level at
which a person is working. The lower echelons with their 8-hour work days
work their 8 hours and then go home, unless there's work that absolutely
definitely positively has to be finished the same day. Those hours are paid
overtime. The higher-ups (managers, and people working at academic levels)
usually don't get paid for their 40 hours, but to get a job done. At that
level, you get told what you must accomplish, and when it must be finished.
If you can do it in 40 hours, you work 40 hours. If it takes 60 hours per
week, you work 60 hours per week.
This is, of course, reflected in your paycheck.
(At the level I've been working the last 12 years, 40 hours per week
usually was enough to get the job done. For Sonja, however, working 60+
hours per week was pretty much common.)
>I've had Brits complain about only starting a new job with 4 weeks
>of vacation, when I had 3 after 13 years with the company.
This might hurt: here you typically get 25 vacation days per year (if you
work full-time). Many people work 38 hours instead of 40, which gets them
12 or 13 additional vacation days per year. After a certain age (50 or
something like that), you get a few more vacation days every few years.
>But, maybe the Netherlands is different. Do salaried workers regularly put
>in nights and weekends?
When necessary, yes. But only when necessary. We work to live, we don't
live to work.
>Have you gone to work on a major holiday to be sure
>that things will go right?
No, because when you go on a holiday for a few weeks, you make sure other
people take over while you're gone, just as you'll do some of their work
when they go on vacation. In the higher echelons, it ocassionally happens
that someone gets called back from vacation, but things have to get very
much out of control before that happens.
>But I know that the average Dutch worker does not put in 80 hour weeks and
>spend a week at a time away from home.
At the higher levels, 60 hours or more per week aren't uncommon. Spending a
week at the time away from home usually isn't necessary, because The
Netherlands is a small country (the largest distance north to south is ~350
kilometers). Spending time away from home uhappens only when you know
you'll be making long hours, or when you're working abroad.
Jeroen
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