The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-07-08
TAXES IN NEW YORK.

One of the continual problems that come before the raisers of revenue in the large cities is the difncuity of col lecting taxes from those who are dis posed to evade this responsibility, and who have the opportunity of SO doing. This is especially true of the taxes on personal property, because 1t is so much easier to hide out" this class of property than it is in the case of real estate. New York Is a fine example of .'how not to do it" when 1t comes to collecting the taxes on personality. The New York Commercial states that the increased assessments on real estate in Greater New York over last year Is a little more than half a billion dollars. while for the same period there has been a faUing off in the assessments of personal property of a little more than twelve million dollars.
 As The Commercial elsewhere re- marks these figures are ridiculously in- correct, so far as showing the real facts of the case. With the increase ir population. and with an increase of nearly nine per cent in the assessed taxable values of real estate 1t is ab- surd to suppose that the value of per. sonality has decreased. The explana- tion is that these figures show the cor rected lists, after the annual process of swearing off" is over. Tie Com mercial says:
 The explanation of the thing is the the Ssworn off" A specific explanation of this years decrease is given by Presi- dent Purdy of the commission, , now, eontinuancs eonti m s of fa' the policy adopted last when ysara HI it Was clearly apparent that no assessed; This, on toI of mi millions i,o,, upon millions sworn off" other mil, lions of personality assessments were "chalked off" the books. as down East, on the rolls-uncollectible. Last year about S70, ,000. 900 was written off in this way. and this year $20 .00OO or more. Such action was taken ih Tn no,h yyesices yesiEs; 
 mailed to the persons assessed were not delivered for three years consecutively, and no payment had been made on account of the taxes based on such as sessments. If 1t had not been for the elimination of this s20,000,000, the roll would have been increased"
 That can hardly be called a credita- ble showing for a great city, but there's nothing new about 1t. so far as New York is concerned. Each year as the assessments are filed and the lists made out the great millionaires and other people of wealth come up and calmly and systematically swear off a large proportion of their personal as- easements and that amount is deducted from their taxes. Is this honest? Well. it would not be considered so in the | case of a poor man and his little home, but this kind of nest hiding is very l common among the very rich in New York city. The conclusions arrived at by The Commercial are interesting to outsiders It says:
 This presents a fine illustration of the weakness, the ridiculousness. of our tax system here in New York City: A lot of names of supposed holders Of personality taken from directories or telephone lists or former tax rolls, their owners "condemned" to various assessments and letters mailed to them; after three consecutive years or non delivery of these missives-the ad- dresses may be dead or have moved meantime or may never have had any existence, much less any personal prop erty-the department gets tired. cuts these names out of the rolls, and then the same process begins anew. Is II any wonder that the prosperous middle out realty holdings-for the most part escape taxes altogether? clerk in a New York bank, for instance, on sal ary of $2.000 with a rented, modestly furnished house in Bloomfield. N. J.. IS probably assessed regularly about $500 a year on personally and pays a tax of $S or $10, say; the cashier of the same bank on salary of $S,000 lives in an elegantly furnished uptown apartment in Manhattan. keeps a car riage has thousands of dollaVS invested in diamonds and some money in banks but the New York assessors never find him. The system" falls utterly to get at his taxable personality. Still he enjoys police and fire protection, has the use of the streets and the parks and libraries and speedways. and his children absorb the education of the schools. Meantime. his neighbors who own realty are paying their own and his part of the cost of 1t all!