Thursday, May 26, 2011

Cooking up a scheme

For Americans, mention of a 'scheme' suggests nefarious intentions.  Like some shady character twirling his moustache in the shadows and biding his time for the perfect moment to enact his evil purposes.

In New Zealand, 'scheme' means system, plan, organisation, or method.  It carries no nefarious connotation.  We save for retirement under a scheme.   You could take a long vacation here, under a scheme.  Charities have schemes.  Innocent purposes, benevolent even.

That being said, I should also point out that we pay our taxes under a scheme.  Hmm, what was that part about the slimy ne'er-do-wells, again?


I kid, I kid, IRD, no audits needed here!
 

1 comment:

Dad said...

I don't think I'd ever be able to hear the words "tax scheme" without a vision of a 'Snidely Whiplash-type'character loitering behind a pillar in Washington somewhere coming to mind. While none of the current batch of elected officials in D.C. share Snidely's clothing or mustache style, I have to say that plenty of them seem to share his manner of getting ahead in the world.