It’s a new year, so in a fit of preparation, I decided to go and make sure my tax links were all correct before next month when I sit down, watch Black Books Series 1, Episode 1, then figure out how much money I owe the Japanese government.
My first stop for this is always The National Tax Agency website. The English page may look a little 1998-esque, but importantly:
1) There is an English page;
2) It provides a link to the English language summary guide for filling in your tax forms (2013 .pdf here, if you’re interested).
I might write this up next month when I do the taxes, but I have to say that doing your own taxes isn’t so bad. It’s easier than some other things here for sure, and the people involved are actually usually very helpful.
Back to my original point. I was looking around the page and much of it is quite dry, with very dull sounding links like, “Commissioner’s Directive on the Mutual Agreement Procedures (Administrative Guidelines)“, and “Australia, Canada, Japan and the United States issue internal guidance to improve the Mutual Agreement Procedure and Bilateral Advance Pricing Arrangement processes“. Thrilling stuff.
Then, you find links like, “The results of Sake Awards”. I have no idea where that fits on any governments tax pages, but there is a very decent page outlining the winners out of various sake (rice wine) breweries in their pursuit of excellence.
However, the winner of the “Links I Don’t Expect to Find on a Government Tax Page” award goes to:
The results of radiation examination of alcoholic beverages (Last updated on January. 9)
For the purpose of providing consumers with safe and good quality alcoholic beverages, the NTA conducts radioactive examination for alcoholic beverages including those for exports.
So basically, the tax men and women of Japan have managed to get a gig where they have to spend lots of time with alcohol in order to … er … test for radiation safety. And to ensure good quality! The health and foods ministries must be upset they missed out on that job, especially since they seem to have issued the testing guidelines.
Yes, this post is very tongue in cheek.