THE BRIEFING: Be Like Mike

Came across these two random taxes and thought I would share. Both the "jock tax" and "crack tax" are very comical. Well, perhaps the crack tax is a bit funnier.

From CNN.com

The jock tax...

You can thank Michael Jordan for this one. After Jordan's Chicago Bulls put the hurt on the Los Angeles Lakers in the 1991 NBA finals, the state of California began to enforce a nonresident income tax on visiting performers, especially athletes.

Basically, the tax applies to any income earned while competing or performing in California, and it allowed California's Franchise Tax Board to reach into the pockets of Jordan, Pippen, et. al. to extract some revenge for the hard-court beatdown.

Not to be outdone, Illinois, and eventually 18 other states, instituted a jock tax, making a patchwork quilt of tax laws that basketball, baseball, and other sports figures have to consider. Thanks to these regulations, it's more difficult to file a professional athlete's tax return than to map the human genome on a Commodore 64.

The crack tax...

In 1983, Arizona became the first state to implement a "Cannabis & Controlled Substances Tax" in order to boost state revenues and further punish those found guilty of possession.

It works like this: if you are in possession of an illegal drug or illegally produced liquor (aka moonshine), you need to go down to the state tax collection agency and pay the tax on your illegal substances. You are then given tax stamps to affix on your illegal goods.

Sounds insane, right?

Well, part of the code now on the books in more than 30 states says that the tax collection agency is not allowed to rat you out to the local law enforcement agency.

This should put every drug dealer's mind at ease, yet so few of them pay their required taxes. The truth is, many of these taxes are levied in arrears after the local constabulary has caught the criminal dealer. It's really an additional fine for dealing that gets paid straight to the state coffers.

And what of those few people that pay the tax? Records show that the vast majority of them are stamp collectors.