From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Russia's gun-slinging taxmen The Moscow Times (Russia) via THE WEEK 30 September 2000 In the lawless, gun-slinging environment of modern Russia, being a tax collector is no easy job, says Alexander Bratersky. Far from being grey, conscientious characters working quietly at their desks, Russian taxmen are now better known for bursting through doors wearing balaclavas and brandishing automatic weapons - and they're set to get even tougher. In an effort to crack down on organised crime and the black market, the government has set up military-style academies to train tax collectors from childhood. Children as young as ten (most of them either orphans or the sons of police officers) are drafted into the schools and given special lessons in accounting, wrestling, combat training and marksmanship. The Olympic wrestler Alexander Karelin, himself a tax collector by trade, is held up as a role model. The idea is to get back to a tsarist tradition of strong, centrally controlled taxation. But stamping out the black market won't be easy. In a country where bribery can get you just about anything, civil servants are not immune to personal greed. As one young student at a Moscow academy put it, becoming a tax collector is just a "good way to earn money for a house in the Canary Islands". Resurrecting the tsarist tax collection system, it seems, is destined to revive the bad as well as the good. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~given special lessons in accounting, wrestling, combat training and marksmanship.~ Well that's it chaps, I'm off to Russia. My double entry bookkeeping is up to par, I'm not a bad shot (let's not hold a vote on that) and I fancy a villa in the Canaries. All I need to do is brush up on my El Presidente and Inheritance Tax. Incidentally bookkeeping is the only word in English with three consecutive double letters - it takes an accountant to know things like that! Kenneth Pantling Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny. (Edmund Burke�1729-97) Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___________________________________________________________ T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16 Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
