WTA Blog

On 10 September, the German Taxpayers’ Association celebrated its 70th birthday in Berlin in front of around 700 invited guests from politics, business, science, culture and with its members.
The keynote speaker was none other than Federal Chancellor Dr Angela Merkel. Her presence was important in several respects. In her speech, she praised the work of the Taxpayers’ Association, she stressed the necessity of tax cuts which was a great vote of confidence in our work.

On October 23, the National Taxpayers Union celebrated its 50th Anniversary with a gala dinner in Washington, DC featuring more than 300 guests from the organization’s past and present. Lawmakers, state governors, and other public officials were in attendance to view a video on the history of NTU — including an interview from the year 1974 of the organization’s founder on the famous American television program “The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.”

Dear WTA members, observers and friends:

Next WTA events:

Taxpayers Regional Forum in Kyiv Ukraine May 16, 2020

The first WTA-sponsored Regional Taxpayers Forum of 2020 will take place in Kyiv, Ukraine, May 16th.

In May 2020 World Taxpayers Associations along with the Atlas Network and the Ukrainian Economic Freedoms Foundation is pleased to invite delegates to join us in an exchange of ideas and best practices to advance taxpayer advocacy in Europe.

According to the calculations made by Contribuables Associés, the French taxpayers’ association, the ratio between public expenditure (State, local authorities, social security, European Union) and the wealth created in France (GDP) is 55.6% in 2019.

Tax Freedom Day in Austria was August 5th, according to the Austrian Economics Center.
Tax Freedom Day was July 1st in 1976. Since then, the tax burden has grown significantly, pushing the date to August 20th in 2001 and August 19th in 2015.

Dear WTA members, observers and friends:
Past Events:
17th World Taxpayers Conference in Sydney, Australia May 23-27, 2019

July 18th is when the Swedish taxpayers celebrated their Tax Freedom Day in 2018 according to the Swedish Taxpayers Association.

International Governmental Organization (IGO) Watch sent a letter to Finance Ministers across the G20 urging the officials to oppose any attempts to weaponize global conversations about digital commerce to tax tech companies.

Many thanks to the Australian Taxpayers’ Alliance and Tax and Super Australia, especially to Tim Andrews, for hosting and organizing the 17th World Taxpayers’ Conference & 7th Friedman Conference in Sydney in May 2019.  More than 460 people from over 30 countries attended the conference (including four delegates from South-America) thanks in part to scholarships offered by the National Taxpayers Union, Americans for Tax Reform and Atlas Network.

Dear WTA members, observers and friends:

It is a great privilege to write my first message to you as the new Chairman and President of the World Taxpayers Associations. After a fantastic meeting in Sydney, I take over the role from Troy Lanigan, who you will all know or be aware of.