Proposed Dutch tax rate is draconian 41 percent

Further details are now available on our earlier story concerning a move by Dutch legislators to start taxing foreign and 'illegal' online gambling sites, and it appears that taxation will not imply approval or legal recognition.

Specifically, the Dutch Staatssecretaris for fiscal affairs driving the proposal, Jan Cornelis de Jager, argues that tax laws do not differentiate between legal and illegal tax subjects, and that both should therefore be treated with equity by the fiscus.

De Jager (39), a member of the Christian Democratic party who was appointed to the Dutch Cabinet in February last year, was an IT entrepreneur before entering politics and knows his way around the new Internet economy. In 1992, while still at university, he founded IT company Spectra Vision. All business activities were handed over to ISM eCompany (Innovative Solutions in Media) in 1997, where de Jager was CEO until his appointment to the Cabinet.

The mechanics of implementing the suggested and rather draconian 40.85 percent tax are still to be finalised, but it will be based on revenues generated and will include winnings by online gamblers. How this is to be achieved is not yet clear.

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