FROM THE EDITOR

Dr. Emzar Djgerenaia

Georgia has got wet. May rains have washed away grief, pain, old sins and “new visions” .It is strange and surprising for us that someone in Georgia is engaged in calculation of incomes and earnings of alive people, but it is much more humane than what occurs abroad.

Recently I read “Playboy” magazine. Do not laugh, I did that not for admiring beautiful torsos but to read articles on economic problems, and I have found out a very interesting one among them. It appears that abroad, in particular, in London, they calculate not only incomes of alive people, but also (you will not believe) dead. So, for example, in 2003 deceased Elvis Presley had the biggest income – 40 million, John Lennon earned 19 million, his friend Harrison “earned” 16 million lying in a coffin. Dead men make 40 million a year; just imagine what they would do if they were alive!
In a heat of the fiscal reforms which are being carried out in Georgia I reflected on one professional question: what would tax inspectors do if, for example, deceased Elvis Presley didn’t pay the income tax from his 40 million? Probably in England they do not know the answer to this question, but our inspectors know perfectly well what they would do – would dig him out of his grave. In other words, if you bring money you will be buried, if you do not bring it they will get you out of grave. These rainy May days the ground has got wet and it is not difficult to dig out someone from it. As they say, one will not be given rest even in the other world.
Whatever you may say, the western dead men are good fellows unlike our state in which there are about 300 large enterprises that, according to the budget law, in 2004 are going to bring to the country $8 million in all, i.e. half of the sum that Harrison earned last year lying in a coffin and the fifth part of the sum dead Elvis Presley earned. But why our 300 enterprises, the most part of which has strategic importance and is a subject of pride of the whole country, are better than dead Elvis Presley? There was the time in ancient Rome when taxes were not collected and citizens lived on incomes from the state property.
Thanks God, our country does not hope for incomes from its own property, otherwise we would starve to death. It is very difficult to do business and our state has experienced it itself. But why is it so? Isn’t our state a good enough founder and manager? The state controls a huge amount of reserves and money. And time has come for production incomes to constitute the significant part of state revenue. From this point of view almost nothing has changed lately. How can dead John Lennon, let alone Elvis Presley, be better than the whole state?
What a misfortune these rains are! You can’t go outside, and staying at home you may think up a lot. For some reason the incomes of foreign dead men and the scientific – methodological issue of their fiscal effect worries me very much. Yes, it would be quite good to write a scientific research on this subject. Imagine, even if I make a mistake who will have legal proceedings with me?
What people these dead men are: more quiet, more diffident, than alive. It was before their death that they were spongers and terrible “scandalmongers”, but after death everyone becomes quiet and silent, of course, better than many of those alive. Well, is it fair that Elvis Presley died, and some of our industrial complexes, enterprises and their directors are still alive?
I wonder how long the rains will continue. Everything has become covered with mould and moss because of dampness; soon we may start to decay ourselves.