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Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

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Re: Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

#51
I grew up in an area of upstate New York where the land was mostly apportioned into feudal estates by the Dutch. There were anti-rent rebellions in the 19th century and the descendants of the patroons stopped collecting the rent.

But… folks never had title to their land and were effectively stuck until a law was passed in the 1960s. It’s really interesting as the effect is that many families have lived there for 400 years, and newcomers all appeared in the 1970s onward.

Re: Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

#52
post #28
post #5

In the UK, during the purchase of our house we had to take a "chancel liability insurance", because our freehold once belonced to a rectory, so to protect ourselves from repair liability towards a chapel that has been here for centuries, we had to pay a one-off insurance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chancel_repair_liability Leftover laws are weird things. EDIT: PS: sadly, the legendary, obligatory archery practice…

> Leftover laws are weird things. Fun fact: just like this old tax that the Italian residents are unhappy with, every single person that was old enough to vote for their representatives who then voted to ratify the income tax amendment in the USA is now dead. There is no one alive in the USA that was in any way represented in the vote for income tax; conversely everyone that is alive in the US today and is subject to…

Income tax in the USA was meant to be a temporary measure to support a war effort.

There are similar stories in other countries.

There's nothing more permanent than a temporary government plan.

Re: Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

#53
post #43
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It appears that elected officials have an extremely strong bias to adding/amending versus repealing/scaling back. I'm not sure the current approach is long-term viable.

> elected officials have an extremely strong bias to adding/amending versus repealing/scaling back I find this to be a crippling problem of how politics works in modern democracies. Taxes are a great example, because almost every country will increase it, but never decrease it. They’ll think of a 100 new ways to extract taxes, but never remove outdated ones.

Very true: my personal solution is to shop for better countries. There's no way to meaningfully influence the government's overreach. Hopefully this will become a trend and the cheapest countries will attract better talent.

Re: Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

#54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When the likelihood of the risk is small, but the potential damage bill could be financially catastrophic, I think it's perfectly rational to buy insurance if the premium is so low.

Sure. My point is that often the risk is not small, it's non-existent. When I bought my current house my solicitor suggested that the seller should pay for insurance cover for the fact that there was no planning paperwork for a small side extension. Of course I said OK and of course the seller also agreed. But that extension was even shown on the land registry plan and was obviously 20+ years old. Since planning brea…

So I've done the same when I bought my last house(conservatory built 20 years ago, seller couldn't produce the correct paperwork for it), but the issue wasn't the planning permissions per se, it was that the original builder of the house(Belway) hasn't given permission and they reserve the right to do so for 99 years after construction(even though the house is a freehold now, the entire estate is still Belway's leasehold). So the insurance was against that as well.

Like, are the chances of Belway complaining and landing us in legal trouble close to zero? Yes, they are, but like said above - it was £50 and I got the seller to pay for it. When we sell the house I'll do the same just to avoid any bumps in the process because of it.

Re: Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

#55
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Leftover laws are weird things. Fun fact: just like this old tax that the Italian residents are unhappy with, every single person that was old enough to vote for their representatives who then voted to ratify the income tax amendment in the USA is now dead. There is no one alive in the USA that was in any way represented in the vote for income tax; conversely everyone that is alive in the US today and is subject to…

Income tax in the USA was meant to be a temporary measure to support a war effort. There are similar stories in other countries. There's nothing more permanent than a temporary government plan.

I hope that no one is making this same comment about masks and social distancing in 20 years.

Re: Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

#56
post #5

In the UK, during the purchase of our house we had to take a "chancel liability insurance", because our freehold once belonced to a rectory, so to protect ourselves from repair liability towards a chapel that has been here for centuries, we had to pay a one-off insurance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chancel_repair_liability Leftover laws are weird things. EDIT: PS: sadly, the legendary, obligatory archery practice…

> The word Butt is derived from the Anglo French word 'bouter' meaning to expel.

Wow. I suppose that’s the same etymology for “butt” in the anatomological sense?

Re: Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

#57
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Leftover laws are weird things. Fun fact: just like this old tax that the Italian residents are unhappy with, every single person that was old enough to vote for their representatives who then voted to ratify the income tax amendment in the USA is now dead. There is no one alive in the USA that was in any way represented in the vote for income tax; conversely everyone that is alive in the US today and is subject to…

Income tax in the USA was meant to be a temporary measure to support a war effort. There are similar stories in other countries. There's nothing more permanent than a temporary government plan.

No it wasn't. Those for it said that, but it is clear from their efforts of the many decades prior that they wanted it to continue forever.

Re: Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

#58

Italian sources[1] say that the right of the Auguet Barons is 30% of the sale price of a house in the oldest part of the village. This is very different from what the SMH article says. [1] https://www.iltempo.it/attualita/2021/03/12/news/nicola-zing...

Sounds like Apple's 30% feudal tax.

Re: Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

#59
post #11

Note that in a common law system, this would be thrown out of court under either "acquiescence" (if you don't raise a fuss for a very long time when someone unknowingly infringes your rights, you can lose those rights), or "laches" (if you wait long enough to make a legal claim that the defendant is injured by e.g. having made economic decisions in ignorance of that claim). Not sure about the equivalent Italian law,…

The Roman law equivalent is Usucapione, still applicable in Italy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usucaption

the residents now complain that the feudal law is old and should be abolished. it would be funny if they win the case using a Roman law

Re: Italian seaside residents hit with bygone feudal tax

#60
post #5

In the UK, during the purchase of our house we had to take a "chancel liability insurance", because our freehold once belonced to a rectory, so to protect ourselves from repair liability towards a chapel that has been here for centuries, we had to pay a one-off insurance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chancel_repair_liability Leftover laws are weird things. EDIT: PS: sadly, the legendary, obligatory archery practice…

> The word Butt is derived from the Anglo French word 'bouter' meaning to expel. Wow. I suppose that’s the same etymology for “butt” in the anatomological sense?

In the Oxford English Dictionary there are 19 separate entries for "butt" with various disparate senses, including a bundle of cloth, a headland, and a funnel-shaped wicker basket. Some of those entries have complex, multiple etymologies, but the word "buttock" is said to be derived from "butt, n.6" for which the etymology is given as: "Of uncertain origin."

So there you are. Happy to be of no assistance whatsoever!

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