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Come to Think of It, Let’s Skip Italy

Having recklessly pissed away their money and gone into tremendous debt — sort of like the United States and California — the Italian government has come up with a brilliant new "austerity measure." Actually, it’s a whopping new tax on yachts, one that’s certain to drive the country further into debt.

According the British Cruising Association, as of May 1, all yachts, foreign and Italian, will be subject to a new daily tax in Italy. It’s a highly progressive tax. Boats from 33 to 36 feet will have to pay 5 euros a day, which at the current rate of exchange is about $6.50 a day or $195 a month. For boats 37 to 42 feet, it will be 8 euros a day, or $10.40 a day or $312 a month. For boats 43 to 58 feet, about the average size of a Ha-Ha entry, it will be 10 euros a day, which translates to $13 a day, or $390 a month. God help you if you’ve got a bigger boat, for those over 72 feet will have to pay 30 euros a day in tax, which is about $40 a day or $1,200 a month. This is in addition to any berth fees, which run about $700 for a 42-ft boat.

Italian tax collectors expect to cash in on all the boats that are berthed in their country, but we suspect that harbors such as Portofino may empty out in response.

© Ragnatela Luogo

God knows that the Italian Riviera is fantastic. And Capri, Sardinia and Sicily . . . my, oh my. But as fun as Italy is, it’s also very, very expensive to begin with. So you can just imagine how your average cruising sailor is going to react.

It’s unclear to us if Italian legislators know that boats, particularly foreign boats, can untie Italian docklines and leave Italy and such taxes behind. And that it’s only a very short distance to France, Spain, Croatia, Greece, Malta and Tunisia, to name a few, where either there aren’t any such taxes or they aren’t anywhere near as high.

Say you own a business on the Italian coast, be it a marina, chandlery, yacht services, yacht sales, restaurant, clothing or jewelry store. What do you think business is going to be like this summer? Do you plan on hiring additional workers? Or are you simply going to close up shop, and sail off in your little boat to Southeast Asia or some other place where the living is very good, inexpensive and there are no boat taxes?

With Governor Brown suggesting tax increases to raise revenue — as opposed to cutting graft and wretched spending excess, and nixing the plans to spend $100 billion on a choo-choo to nowhere — Californians might want to watch how the bold Italian taxation experiment pans out.

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