The Horse Tax

The high court of Hessen (my local German state) moved to agree that a town's efforts to tax horses....is legal.

This all centers around a town in north Hessen.....Allendorf.  The city council noted a number of folks who live in the local area, and have horses which are used for commercial purposes (racing, shows, etc).  So, they invented a local tax of 200 Euro a year on each horse.

The non-commercial use horse owners?  They get an exemption, as long as they can prove that their horse is just a regular horse without any economic benefit.

This started back in 2012, and was seen as an infringement upon local horse-owners.  They took up the line and so far....no court has gone against the community's new tax.  An attempt at the national level?  I'm taking a guess it'll happen, but they may decline to even hear the episode.

What happens in an episode like this?  I'm guessing that several folks own stables and grazing property at the end of town.....where these commercial-use horses are kept.  It's probably high-value property.  The town has around 5,000 residents, a local airfield, and noted for historical houses within the center of the town.  The city probably would like to build or attract new real estate players....so the stable property has great value but would never be sold.  With a tax on each horse....I'm taking a guess that the stables are reviewing options to pack up and leave the local area.....thus putting the property up for sale eventually.

I'll take a simple guess here....by 2016....there's not a single horse within the city district that is being taxed.  They vacated the town, and have moved onto greener pastures elsewhere.

Figure new property development by 2018 at the latest.....all quietly done, and accomplished by a simple tax on horses.  Pretty nifty work....using the system to force-transfer property from one owner to another.