Friday, September 21, 2012
State, Strip Club Fight Over Taxes
WSJ.com: The answer may seem obvious, but it has attorneys in Albany arguing: How is a ballerina different from a pole dancer? New York's highest court, the Court of Appeals, will hear arguments on Wednesday in a case pitting the state's Department of Taxation and Finance against a strip club called Nite Moves that is situated about 15 minutes from the state Capitol.
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8 comments:
I have to say that I do think Nite Moves should be taxed. Taxes can be lifted from things like ballet performances because those are more a form of self expression being enjoyed by an audience. Strippers are performing purely for the product and their audience is paying for an immediately gratifying service. While they may have choreographed moves, the moves are again to illicit the completion of their product, pleasure. With the taxes collected from night clubs, which I'm sure would amount to quite a lot, their could be improvements made around the state that would benefit the public.
This article is fantastic. It is well written and posses an interesting argument. Is stripping a performance art? On principle I want to say no, but... How is this any different than the article from a couple of weeks ago about the two female dancers, performing at the Invisible Dog in Brooklyn, using dildo's. If that is a performance "non taxable" art, then why isn't this?
I am in no way saying, everyone should run out and see the great performances at your local strip club, it's just an interesting topic to ponder.
my question to Jacquelyn, is theater not an immediately gratifying service? Does a theatre audience not derive please from the performance?
The tax codes need to be adjusted and we need to make it simpler with fewer loopholes based on peoples personal beliefs and morals. Make the tax code simple to understand and simple to enforce. Tax exemptions and loopholes need to be closed and people need to get off their moral high horse and just let things happen as they happen.
Wow, this article was eye-opening... I guess I've never thought about whether strip clubs "count" as performance spaces, but now that I think about it, I'm not sure that they are much different. I don't think that it's fair of the prosecution to say that because the strippers aren't necessarily trained, that means they are not dancers. Street dancers aren't trained. The article points out that Eric Clapton wasn't trained either.
I don't agree with Jacquelyn's opinion about self expression v. performance... I don't think you can separate the two. Ballet dancers perform for the product and the pleasure of the audience. Some strippers may do the exact same thing. It could even be a means of self expression... why do you think there are pole-dancing classes popping up at every gym? I'm not saying that I think that pole-dancing is the epitome of self-expressive art, but I do think that the government shouldn't have the right to decide whether it's a performance.
This is by far the most interesting article I've read on this page. I can see both sides of this argument. It says that most of these girls learn their moves from slow nights at the club but I would imagine that those girls still enjoy it and use it to express themselves. Its a very thin politically correct line you can walk with this argument. One that no matter the result, one side is going to be unhappy with it. I would assume that this club also serves as a bar and if that is the case than that should also be taken into consideration in this debat.
While the question of what constitutes "art" is pretty subjective, the seriousness of the First Amendment's protection of free speech is less so. The basic ideas supporting the laws that protect all forms of live entertainment from being taxed comes straight out of this amendment. (This article from a similar situation in Las Vegas in 2007 explains that pretty well: http://www.lvrj.com/news/8961847.html). I would like to agree with what Taylor said about the Invisible Dog...what's the difference between what those women are doing on stage and what strip club dancers are doing? Sure, one may have some sort of strange artistic message fueling the dance and the other may not, but what they're presenting is the same at the core- self expression in the form of dance performed nude in front of an audience who seeks pleasure from the experience. On the topic of exotic dancers being trained or not, some are and some aren't, so it's not fair to make such a generalization and call what they do less than art simply because some have trained more for it than others. I know a handful of girls that have worked in strip clubs and I know that they work very hard for the money they earn. Not only do they train to learn new dance moves, they also train hard to keep their bodies in shape. All of this considered, as a person who comes from a state that benefits quite a bit from strip club performance fees being taxed, I do not that think they should be taxed. Just because strip club performances are for a more adult audience and are less focused on being artistic doesn't mean that they are not still expressive performances that deserve to be protected under the First Amendment.
I think one angle that has yet to be explored in this discussion is the whole reason for the tax exemption in the first place. I have had a really difficult time of trying to pull up NY State Tax Code, but in most situations, the way to apply for tax exemption is to become a not-for-profit organization under IRS Section 501 (this is where the well-known 501(c)(3) organization name comes from). Inherently, this company is a for-profit business venture, and has not applied for not-for-profit status, nor did they apply for tax exempt status ahead of opening for sales. We can consider the $20 "couch fees" as tips if you like, and the dancers are likely salaried, but the $11 cover fee feeds into the books as revenue and excess would be paid out as profit to the owners, not go back into the business. So while the discussion of what constitutes non-taxable performance art is an interesting one on this topic, I'm not sure the strip club has much argument unless it's willing to argue that what it does satisfies an artistic mission benefiting the community and committing to not taking profit on sales.
This is one of these instances where our inability to define art and draw hard lines for what is a performance and what isn't comes into play and leads to a very interesting situation. We are taught that stripping is distasteful and therefore can't possibly be a form of art, but aren't strippers just simply yet another type of dancers? This certainly is a very interesting issue, and brings up many ethical points. I personally believe the strip club can defend their position.
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