Some quite bad news has come from an oft-cited “tax free” offshore haven: Vanuatu to impose their first ever payroll and income taxes—without any public comment. The plan is for a payroll tax, beginning in 2017, and then an income tax, beginning in 2018. Vanuatuan officials claim that the offsetting revenue generated by these new taxes will allow them to do away with the current rent tax and also to “reduce” import duties. They say that they also “hope” to eventually reduce the hated Value Added Tax (VAT), but they are making no promises. In sum, these new taxes make Vanuatu far less desirable as an offshore haven. (Up until this was announced, many Australians, Britons and Americans were willing to put up with Vanuatu’s fairly sucky gun laws, a hot and rainy climate, and frequent natural disasters, in exchange to live their lives tax free. But now, not so much.)
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Bank of America Says We’re Experiencing ‘Peak’ Everything and a Major Market Change is Coming
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We observe that the U.S. stock market is again approaching stratospheric heights: Shiller P/E – A Better Measurement of Market Valuation. What goes up must come down. In my estimation this is a good time to get out of most of your stock holdings, regardless of the outcome of the upcoming election!
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