#SLOE: People's Basketball Sim League

First: We all play by the same rules. We all see the lux tax thread and know the penalties for exceeding it. There is no one to blame but us for our tax bills.

With that out of the way, I think the top end of the lux tax is potentially too punitive, and the two offenders (as well as potentially another on the horizon) are in a pretty rough spot. So it got me to thinking. Is there a just punishment for the most egregious tax violation that doesn't impact the fun of the game, and might actually encourage/incentivize participation.

So here's a suggestion. It's not fully baked, I'm not married to it, and I am actively seeking feedback, but it's something like.

If you have a significant outstanding tax bill and you meet the following criteria:
1. Have experienced the penalties of delinquency for at least 5 seasons
2. Have remained active (not missing a ton of DCs, FA, etc.)
3. Have made active efforts to acquire points (maybe a minimum number of articles per season, selling cap space, etc.)
4. Anything else y'all think is appropriate

Then you can reduce your tax liability by half, or to a maximum of 200 points, whichever is fewer.

Again, all of this is up for debate. I think it still leaves the lux tax as incredibly punitive, basically making you sit out almost a calendar year (irl), but gives an easier path back while encouraging participation.

Just an idea, excited to hear thoughts.

not a bad idea.

I'm really not crazy about this idea. Like you started with, each GM knows the risk of going into repeater tax infractions. Inserting a rule like this, although would get some more involvement, effectively bails out owners who made the decision to get that deep into the tax while the rest of us GMs made the decision not to do that. Knowing that a large tax bill is imminent allows teams to take some measure to cut into it throughout the year between trades and articles, which is often not taken advantage of by those teams.

That being said, I would also like to contribute to this conversation should it develop so let me throw out some ideas for this topic.

I agree that teams that want to qualify for this should have participation in the league and attempt at points as possible. So teams that want to qualify for this should have no missed DCs, full media points gained, and all voting that is given points participated. To make if fair and accountable for a bailout, this should be required set for a minimum number of years. If we want to say five years in the tax is the setting point, I think that we should say more than half. So in this example, three years of full participation would be required. Any misses would set you back to the beginning. This idea may seem a bit harsh, but this post is ultimately about a bailout which should require more from a GM.

If we agree upon 5 years as being the basis for getting this break, then we can cut down on the requirements some and say something like three years straight of full participation allows for the tax break. However, I would say that full participation must continue until the tax amount is completely paid off. This idea means that people aren't just participating for the tax break and going back to not putting in DCs or media entries upon receiving it.

A possible idea that has been proposed in the past outside of this is distributing all tax points to teams that did not go into the luxury tax. Although won't be a flat bailout, it will give teams that have been in the tax for years the incentive to get under the tax for years for additional points.

The average tax bill in general over the past five years is right under 50 points. If you look at the full participation for three years straight, that is approximately 90 points (complete estimate). I think cap of 200 seems like a lot considering the average luxury tax bill per year. I would lean more towards 100. Although that doesn't get them completely out of the hole, it gets them on the right track. which means after three season, someone with a 400 point luxury tax would have it basically cut in half. This still discourages teams from accruing that much tax, but also gives some help to those teams willing to take the participation steps to get the tax break.

TL;DR
-I don't like the idea since we all knew the implications of taxes.
-full participation for three years of missed taxes. any missed participation starts count over
-participation must continue until tax is completely paid
-disperse tax points to teams under tax
-maximum of 100

Yeah, not really a fan of any of this

Me either. It doesn't go nearly far enough. This is supposed to be a game. Seems like that's been forgotten.

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I think one thing we're talking about is increasing the media cap for teams delinquent in the tax over 100 points so they can earn their way out, instead of just "giving them a break". All tax teams know what they're getting into before the season starts, so it's not this oopsy-daisy mistake. I think until we find a team over 100 points thats has reached the media cap, this point is moot.