Tax rebate should not be made an attraction for talents, says an article in China Youth Daily. The following is an excerpt:

The municipal government of Nanjing, Jiangsu province, recently granted a rebate on the preceding year's personal income tax for high- level management personnel and technicians in software firms on condition they buy a house and a car in the city.

Though the rule was made with good intentions of attracting talented people, it is simply illegal as it goes against the existing law on personal income tax, clauses of which are beyond the city's administrative power.

The country's tax system is conducted with unified standards. In other words, any exceptional revision would paralyze the system because many other cities will surely join in the competition either to attract talents or for other purposes.

Moreover, it will cause serious damage to our society's harmonious order. The personal income tax is a tool that is supposed to be used for adjusting and narrowing income gaps so that social justice can be achieved.

There is nothing wrong about attracting and recruiting talents to serve the local economy. But to achieve that, more should be done to improve the working environment for talents rather than change a national law casually.

(China Daily July 30, 2008)