New times, old law
New times, old law
It seems that the Jakarta city administration is in dire need
of cash again. How can one tell? By the fact it intends to start
levying taxes on radios, again. Like such taxes as duties on
television sets, bicycles or dogs, radio taxes have always been a
convenient means for government administrators to get some
additional cash when needed.
We do not know how many radio owners the Jakarta city tax
officials have been able to register.
There should be quite a number considering that March 31 --
the day before yesterday -- was supposed to be the last day on
which the special team assigned to do the initial registering and
collecting of the taxes were to conduct their operations. And it
was in the middle of last January that the intended campaign was
made public by the head of the Jakarta revenues office, Fauzi
Alvi Yasin.
Fauzi informed the public that officials representing the
municipal revenues office, the city treasury, the postal services
and the various district administrations would be going from door
to door to register all owners of radios in order to properly
levy the taxes. Taxpayers could register themselves and pay their
duties either immediately to the team's officials or do so
through the services of the municipal revenues or post offices.
To be sure, the collection of radio taxes has a proper legal
basis: Law no.14, dated 1994. Besides this, the city
administration needs to utilize all of the resources it has at
its disposal if it is to give Jakarta's citizens the best
possible service.
The problem that comes to mind, however, has nothing to do
with legality. It concerns the questions of "how" and "why" this
taxation on radios being conducted, aside from when, as already
discussed.
As for the first question, that of how to collect the taxes,
we may recall the difficulty which the authorities were having
some time ago in collecting television taxes from the owners of
TV sets. And surely, television is by a long shot not as common
as radios are in this country. How many Indonesians own
television sets, and how many own radios? A walk through almost
any neighborhood in Jakarta will convince anyone that radios are
no longer luxury items that only the privileged can afford.
It could, of course, be argued that the tax collectors could
simply do the best they can and register as many taxpayers as
they can find. But then, the question of fairness arises. Is it
fair to impose an equal tax burden on street vendors and company
executives? And what about such expensive electronic gadgets as
receivers? Or radios that are built into hi-fi amplifiers and
that may cost millions of rupiahs apiece? Are they going to be
taxed at the same rate as cheap pocket transistor radios -- if
they are ever found?
Of no less importance, however, is the question of why radios
have to be taxed. Considering the success of the television
viewers' groups known as klompencapir, we would say it is in the
government's own interest that the ownership of cheap radios be
encouraged, rather than discouraged by taxation. For those who
don't know, klompencapir are organized groups of television
viewers in rural areas through which government officers
disseminate information that is relevant to this country's
development efforts. It may not be too exaggerated to say that a
good part of the success of our rural development program has
been due to such groups.
In other words, we believe that it is time we recognize that
laws and regulations can become outdated and irrelevant to the
age we live in. In the case of radios, it may be better to charge
a one-time lump-sum tax on the item when it is sold. Aside from
making the taxes easier to collect, greater fairness can be
assured because rates can be tied to the sales price. This
approach may be worth considering.