China: Crowdsourced tax enforcement • Hacker News Board

Re: China: Crowdsourced tax enforcement

#21

Post by codemac » Sun, Apr 22, 2012, 11:42 PM UTC

gurkendoktor wrote: post #14

yaix wrote: post #4

>>China’s clever solution is to make every fapiao a lottery ticket. That's not "China's clever solution" but quite common. They had that in Mexico already more than 10 years ago when I lived there (the cash register in stores whould print out these "lottery numbers" onto the receipt). The fapiao in the picture is from Guangdong, elsewhere I have seen only 100 kuai with scratch off fields, not ten kuai.

Taiwan also has a variation of this, being an even closer source of inspiration than Mexico for China. It's crazy - the cleaning staff at my dormitory was absolutely obsessive about fishing each one of them out of the trash, even though the chance of winning is terrible...a good indicator of how little some people's time is still worth, sadly.

The worth of someone's time is not determined from how much they are paid for that time.

Re: China: Crowdsourced tax enforcement

#22

Post by PakG1 » Mon, Apr 23, 2012, 3:19 AM UTC

ephermata wrote: post #18

PakG1 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're getting only 2 or 3K RMB per month, I think that's seriously robbery, even if you do have the ability to claim expenses on everything else. That's what only new graduates get, and low-level Chinese university new grads at that. I have a friend who just moved from IBM to Microsoft recently (we're both in China). Microsoft definitely pays more than that. I have no idea where you're getting this 2 or 3K number…

I read that as "the employer pays you 2K or 3K RMB less than what it otherwise would" , not "the employer pays only 2K or 3K RMB per month."

That would logically make much more sense.

Re: China: Crowdsourced tax enforcement

#23

Post by seanmcdirmid » Mon, Apr 23, 2012, 3:47 AM UTC

PakG1 wrote: post #11

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It used to be more common in the past: you buy something, and the fapiao (certified tax receipt) would include some sort of scratch off thing that was like a lottery; so you had some incentive to collect your fapiao and preventing the department store from low balling their taxes. Store owners are not supposed to recycle unclaimed fapiaos, that is definitely illegal, and many companies who follow the law to the lette…

If you're getting only 2 or 3K RMB per month, I think that's seriously robbery, even if you do have the ability to claim expenses on everything else. That's what only new graduates get, and low-level Chinese university new grads at that. I have a friend who just moved from IBM to Microsoft recently (we're both in China). Microsoft definitely pays more than that. I have no idea where you're getting this 2 or 3K number…

I'm employed by a western company that doesn't play fapiao games, and I get a lot more than that (how much is confidential, but I make just a bit less than I would in the states for a comparable position). Many of my friends get fairly low salaries (2/3K may be outdated, its probably more like 4/5K now), but get a lot of "benefits" that I don't; especially if they work for SOEs (state owned companies); i.e., many have nice cars (provided) but not enough money to really park them (not provided).

Re: China: Crowdsourced tax enforcement

#24

Post by gurkendoktor » Mon, Apr 23, 2012, 3:57 PM UTC

codemac wrote: post #21

gurkendoktor wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taiwan also has a variation of this, being an even closer source of inspiration than Mexico for China. It's crazy - the cleaning staff at my dormitory was absolutely obsessive about fishing each one of them out of the trash, even though the chance of winning is terrible...a good indicator of how little some people's time is still worth, sadly.

The worth of someone's time is not determined from how much they are paid for that time.

Hm, what other conclusion would you draw from this?

Re: China: Crowdsourced tax enforcement

#25

Post by codemac » Thu, Apr 26, 2012, 6:35 AM UTC

gurkendoktor wrote: post #24

codemac wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worth of someone's time is not determined from how much they are paid for that time.

Hm, what other conclusion would you draw from this?

Simple: They think the possibility of earning more money for their time is less than the possibility of winning the lottery.

It's a matter of desperation, not a matter of low worth.