252 VALUATION, DEPRECIATION AND THE RATE-BASE
State Tax Commission. The owners or lessees of mines are
ordered to furnish annual statements supplying the Commission
with the necessary data to determine the net proceeds. Surface
improvements are taxed as other like property. Unproductive
patented mining claims are assessed and taxed on a reasonable
valuation as undeveloped mineral lands in addition to their
surface value whatever it may be. The law for the taxation of
mining property was drawn up by the attorney of one of the
large mining companies in New Mexico and is believed to be
satisfactory to the mining interests.
Utah has a system for assessing on the basis of the net
proceeds but the State Board of ;Equalization does not allow
deduction for interest, taxes, insurance, legal expenses, etc., so
the mines are really being taxed on more than their net proceeds.
Mexico prior to the Carranza regime placed an annual surface
tax of 6 pesos per pertenencia (100 meters square) on all claims
of less than 25 pertenencias in size. On each pertenencia in
excess of 25 the annual charge is only 3 pesos. A state or
federal tax on output could be levied not to exceed 13 per cent
of the assay value. The tax on reduction plants was 0.6 per cent
of the valuation but other improvements were not taxed. When
ore was exported unrefined it was taxed 33 per cent of the assay
value but when it was refined in Mexico the export tax was
only 22 per cent of the assay value.
Since the de facto government has been controlled by Car-
ranza, an annual tax has been established at the rate of $6 per
hectare on a property of not over ro hectares, $7.50 per hectare
on the acreage in excess of 10 hectares and below 20 hectares;
$0 per hectare on that from 20 to 50 hectares; and $12 per
hectare on all above 50 hectares.
Recent developments in Mexico are such that it cannot be
stated with definiteness what is the method of mine taxation.
German South-West Africa. — British consular reports state
that the mines of German South-West Africa were taxed by an
empirical method. The tax amounted to the difference be-
tween 66 per cent of the gross value of the output and 70 per cent
