Forgive me if I got the terminology wrong, but are there universal tax laws?

@NerdyPotato I have a fear that if I don't understand the rules properly I might make a huge mistake and get into a lot of trouble lol 😂 🥲

@Fishy yes, that is a real possibility...

@NerdyPotato Only in the US.

@ninalanyon some countries charge more than others, but I don't know of any country that doesn't have taxes at all.

@NerdyPotato I was referring to the US-centric knee jerk assertion that the government makes you do all the work and punishes you severely if you get the numbers wrong. In the countries with which I am most familiar (UK, Norway) this is simply not the case.

Also according to https://nomadcapitalist.com/global-citizen/countries-no-income-tax/ there are 16 countries that do not tax personal income.

@ninalanyon fair enough. The Netherlands jails people for tax fraud too, but honest mistakes can be rectified in other ways. And citizens here have to finalize the details, but the government already does fill in some basic information for us. So I guess that is quite different.

@NerdyPotato Here in Norway the tax authorities notify when they have your proposed tax return ready. You log in to the government web site and review it. For most people there is nothing to do except click the button that says that it is all correct. Mine is a tiny bit more complicated because I have a bank account in the UK. I just have to specify how much is in the account and how much interest was earned in the last 12 months. This is done online of course. Once I have submitted that information i can see the results of the tax calculation immediately so I can plan for paying any back tax once the official calculation has been done a few months later.