The World Health Organization seems to be tired of things like exercising fiscal responsibility, and earning respect so they can collect donations and do good work. You see, they’ve released a plan to coerce governments world wide to impose direct taxes that are for the exclusive use of the WHO. And it’s not a pretty sight for those of us who make their living on the Internet.
Why, you ask? Because they want to impose a “bit tax” on all Internet use. Quoting from the WHO report, a “bit” tax could raise “tens of billions of U.S. dollars”. Which means that not only do they want to impose a “bit” tax. They want to specifically target this Internet tax to the United States.
That’s right… The more you use the Internet the more they want to collect from you. And who uses more Internet capacity than anyone? Well, certainly the United States. And breaking it down further that would be people who make their living on the Internet. Like Performance Marketers? ECommerce Companies? and Affiliates?
Now don’t think I don’t like the WHO. They do some fine work. And even when they mess up (every organization messes up occasionally) it’s okay if they fix their problems and move on. But lately the WHO has been having difficulties in keeping their own house in order. Their budget is seemingly out of control and they have been very slow to implement changes needed to control their own budget.
The most frightening part of the management of the WHO is that 38% of their budget is dedicated the the operation of their headquarters in Geneva Swizerland (a very expensive place for a Headquarters). In the United States a common number for charities is 20%. That is to say that if a non for profit organization has overhead expenses over 20% of contributions then they have a management problem. And the WHO’s “problem” is nearly double that.
But this doesn’t seem to bother the WHO. In documents prepared for the World Health Assembly on May 22, 2010 (just a few days away) they note that the fundraising effort would involve global changes in legal structures — and policing. As the report puts it: “Introducing a new tax or expanding an existing tax may require legal changes, nationally and internationally and ongoing regulation to ensure compliance.” Which in short means that the World Health Organization wants to change tax laws in many countries in order to impose taxes. One of which would be a “bit” tax on the use of the Internet itself.
It is also interesting to note that the WHO’s desire for an Internet Tax is their perceived single largest form of getting money. The report states, “Internet traffic is huge and likely to increase rapidly; this tax could
yield tens of billions of US dollars from a broad base of users”. Oh, if it were only so easy for those of us in the Performance Marketing industry where our funding comes both from smart and hard work… And the voluntary purchase of goods and services by our customers.
This is another item to add to our “watchlists” and to stay on top of. The last thing Performance Affiliate Marketers need if for higher operating costs and incentives for our customers to use the Internet less.
This STORY on Fox News, the WHO Website, and other Internet Resources were used to compile this post.
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