Wisconsin Mulls an Earmarked Video Game Tax

Mearlus writes "A Wisconsin lawmaker is proposing a law to add an additional tax on video games and equipment in order to help cover the costs of moving 17-year-old criminals back into the juvenile system." (According to the article, 17-year-olds are at present treated as adults by Wisconsin courts.)

Taxing the wrong thing...

[RocketScientist]

This is like putting a tax on gas to pay for roads. Great, but what about hybrid cars, electric cars, and people who ride the bus?

Direct taxation works best. Tax the people who contribute to the juvenile delinquincy problem: Parents. Tax all crotchfruit. Figure out what the average child tax deduction is, double it, and apply it as a state tax to pay for the costs the state bears for the kids, schooling them, policing them, and raising them since parents don't do any of that anymore.

The state should be paying video game companies. After all, that's who's raising kids anymore, right? Parents sure as hell aren't doing it based on the screaming, obnoxious brats I see running around.

17 is considered adult in Wisconsin

[antaeus]

It's true that 17-year-olds are considered adults in the eyes of the law (if not elsewhere). And they can prosecute younger children as adults for some serious crimes.

As for this tax, though... it sounds like another freshman politician who's trying to show that he's got some fresh ideas. I suspect that the proposal will get some half-hearted consideration because the goal is a good idea (providing funding for rehabilitation efforts), but ultimately it will fall short when people realize that it's a backhanded way of equating video games and criminality. It will likely make for a few ticker mentions on CNN, adding to our image of hokiness, and then slip away. But this being Wisconsin (largely a conservative state, with the exception of its population centers in Milwaukee and the 'People's Republic of Madison'), it could end up getting a lot of attention for a while.

How is it more expensive for juvie court?

[Fallen Kell]

Seriously here. How can this be more expensive than treating the kids as adults? The kids are in a lower security area (juvie detention), which doesn't cost nearly as much to maintain as similar adult areas. The court costs are less because typically the state will not spend as much money in lab work/analysis/expert witnesses, etc., since they will at most only put the kid away until he/she is 25, and there is normally only just a Judge, no jury, so daily costs for keeping the jury do not exist (food/drink, and if sequestered, housing and transportation). So again, how is this going to cost the state more?

I can see them wasting some money in the short term for cases that are already partially processed having to now be shifted back to juvie and started over, but that is probably only a few hundred cases at most and will be a one time cost... A cost that will be recovered shortly due to the reductions in other areas.