5 ms·

My (half) brother is Danish. The 'anti tax' statement is his, told to me, while I was in Denmark. The Danish tax authorities have to know specific things about

My (half) brother is Danish. The 'anti tax' statement is his, told to me, while I was in Denmark. The Danish tax authorities have to know specific things about your status - including if you carpool to work or not, in order to establish your tax status. They tax in a different way there - they establish your 'effective rate', rather than doing tons of deductions. Whether or not you carpool for example, affects your rate. He indicated to me that misrepresenting anything - even a minor issue to the tax authorities - is a fairly serious crime. To contrast - the last time I met with him in Denmark, I went to dinner with some of his 'friends'. One of them had just gotten out of a 'halfway house' for murder. He spent almost no time in actual jail. Anecdotal, but legitimate nevertheless. The 'anti business' attitude in Scandinavian countries is (or was) palpable, esp. among anyone over say 45. It's a much more difficult thing to illustrate, but go ahead and talk to an older Swede. You'll see what I mean.

kalleboo 10y ago
> The 'anti business' attitude in Scandinavian countries is (or was) palpable, esp. among anyone over say 45. It's a much more difficult thing to illustrate, but go ahead and talk to an older Swede. You'll see what I mean. I'm Swedish, my Aunt is a hardcore "thought the USSR was great"-Vänsterpartiet-leftist, but even she does some work as self-employed entrepreneur and when I came of age and started doing contract work breathlessly started telling me about all the stuff I could deduct off my taxes. I don't think you can generalize this.
- dang 10y ago
  Comments about aunts and uncles, the more eccentric the better, do wonders for off-topic HN subthreads.
adamlett 10y ago
misrepresenting anything - even a minor issue to the tax authorities - is a fairly serious crime You have to understand that in Denmark, salaried workers don't have to report their own taxes. Their employers and bank are obliged to do it for them. Only on the rare occasion when the bank or the employer don't have all the information, do most Danes have to edit their tax return. This state of affairs makes it hard to make "an honest mistake", when doing your taxes, and you have to go out of your way to cheat outright. It's hard to comment on your anecdote about the murderer when I don't know the details, but I can tell you that the penalty for murder in Denmark is between 5 years and life in prison. I think the average sentence is 12 years, but I can't find a source for that.
- ptaipale 10y ago
  But isn't the system the same as we have in Finland: although employers report to the tax authorities and deposit PAYE, the tax authorities make a calculation and send it to the employee. But the individual is still responsible for declaring any income. You don't have to send back the report, if it includes everything and you aren't making any deductions. But if you have income that's not known by the tax authorities, and you don't report it, that's a crime.
  - adamlett 10y ago
    Yes, that sounds similar. My post was not meant to contrast Denmark with the world, but Scandinavia with the US, where it's the task of the individual to report any income. This makes it easier make mistakes or to cheat.
    - ptaipale 10y ago
      Sure, but my point on the other hand was that also in Scandinavia, the responsibility of submitting a correct report still ultimately lies with the taxpayer.
philippoi 10y ago
Denmark has gotten a lot better at encouraging business growth, lowering the capital requirement for registering a private company and introducing a new "start-up" business type that costs 1-DKK to register. With that business type you have three years to grow up to the capitalization level of private company and your qualification as such once you do achieve that level is pretty much automatic, at least as far as I can recall from my Knowlege Based Entrepreneurship class from a year ago. The start-up business type is mostly unknown, as it hasn't been marketed very well to the public. I'm glad I got to learn about it because it seems quite a bit easier and cheaper than starting a similar company in the US.

kalleboo 10y ago

> The 'anti business' attitude in Scandinavian countries is (or was) palpable, esp. among anyone over say 45. It's a much more difficult thing to illustrate, but go ahead and talk to an older Swede. You'll see what I mean. I'm Swedish, my Aunt is a hardcore "thought the USSR was great"-Vänsterpartiet-leftist, but even she does some work as self-employed entrepreneur and when I came of age and started doing contract work breathlessly started telling me about all the stuff I could deduct off my taxes. I don't think you can generalize this.

dang 10y ago
Comments about aunts and uncles, the more eccentric the better, do wonders for off-topic HN subthreads.

adamlett 10y ago

misrepresenting anything - even a minor issue to the tax authorities - is a fairly serious crime You have to understand that in Denmark, salaried workers don't have to report their own taxes. Their employers and bank are obliged to do it for them. Only on the rare occasion when the bank or the employer don't have all the information, do most Danes have to edit their tax return. This state of affairs makes it hard to make "an honest mistake", when doing your taxes, and you have to go out of your way to cheat outright. It's hard to comment on your anecdote about the murderer when I don't know the details, but I can tell you that the penalty for murder in Denmark is between 5 years and life in prison. I think the average sentence is 12 years, but I can't find a source for that.

ptaipale 10y ago
But isn't the system the same as we have in Finland: although employers report to the tax authorities and deposit PAYE, the tax authorities make a calculation and send it to the employee. But the individual is still responsible for declaring any income. You don't have to send back the report, if it includes everything and you aren't making any deductions. But if you have income that's not known by the tax authorities, and you don't report it, that's a crime.
- adamlett 10y ago
  Yes, that sounds similar. My post was not meant to contrast Denmark with the world, but Scandinavia with the US, where it's the task of the individual to report any income. This makes it easier make mistakes or to cheat.
  - ptaipale 10y ago
    Sure, but my point on the other hand was that also in Scandinavia, the responsibility of submitting a correct report still ultimately lies with the taxpayer.

philippoi 10y ago

Denmark has gotten a lot better at encouraging business growth, lowering the capital requirement for registering a private company and introducing a new "start-up" business type that costs 1-DKK to register. With that business type you have three years to grow up to the capitalization level of private company and your qualification as such once you do achieve that level is pretty much automatic, at least as far as I can recall from my Knowlege Based Entrepreneurship class from a year ago. The start-up business type is mostly unknown, as it hasn't been marketed very well to the public. I'm glad I got to learn about it because it seems quite a bit easier and cheaper than starting a similar company in the US.