BUENOS AIRES — In its protracted battle to close off access to the foreign exchange market in this dollar-crazy country, the Argentine government is now picking a fight with credit card users.  Stringent restrictions on foreign currency have led to soaring credit-card use abroad: Paying by plastic is one of the few ways Argentine travelers have of avoiding the black market premium on dollar bills, currently 36 percent.  No longer. Starting in October, Argentine banks will automatically apply a 15 percent fee on all purchases made with credit or debit cards abroad.  Argentina isn’t the first country to tax foreign purchases: Brazil does, too (at 6 percent). But the way the government announced the measure — first insisting the fee would only apply to credit cards, then extending it to debit cards and purchases on foreign Web sites — reveals a make-it-up-as-you-go approach to patching up problems of its own creation.  Officials describe the new fee as a way of encouraging domestic tourism and combating capital flight. That might seem innocuous enough, but when Ricardo Echegaray, head of the Administración Federal de Ingresos Públicos, the national tax agency, said last Friday, “We prefer that people stay and spend their summers inside the country,” he set Argentines on edge with fears of state-mandated vacation destinations.  On Monday he tried to backpedal — only to make matters worse. “Those who are current with their taxes can travel,” he said. “Wherever and whenever they want.” The implication was clear: The government wants to crack down on tax cheats and will use the new measure to scrutinize travelers’ financial records.  In fact, along with the 15 percent surcharge, the government will also require banks to hand over to the AFIP detailed data of all their customers’ purchases. The agency has vowed that, armed with this data, it will make sure travelers pay the officially required but usually ignored 50-percent customs duty on goods worth more than $300.  This raises a number of questions. How can the AFIP know that if I bought an iPad in New York, I didn’t give it to someone else before returning to Argentina? Short of catching buyers in flagrante at the border or searching their homes, it seems impossible to prove that they brought something into the country at all.  Officials insist that the surcharge isn’t a tax but a credit that Argentines can use to offset income and personal-wealth taxes; come tax time, the government says, it will refund those who have paid more than they owe. But with inflation running at 25 percent, much of the refunds’ value will have been eaten up before they are even handed out.  What’s more, demanding reimbursement seems like asking for trouble: It’s like begging tax inspectors to take a closer look at your records. Tax evasion is rampant in Argentina. People don’t just try to slip a new laptop by customs, they pay for an apartment in cash so they can declare it costs less than it really does. Many, particularly the self-employed, keep much of their earnings off the books. To bypass taxes is celebrated as a mark of cunning.  It’s cunning that costs the government, of course. Some experts say the state receives only half the income taxes it could be collecting.  So, yes, more control is necessary. But not this kind. What Argentina really needs is a top-down fiscal reform that would make paying taxes feel less like being taken for a fool. Yet in almost a decade in power, the self-described populist governments of President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, and of her late husband Néstor before her, have failed to pass no-brainer measures, like extending capital-gains tax to financial transactions.  Tax reform, which is always controversial, is best carried out when the economy is booming. With Argentina’s economy slumping, the president’s approval ratings dropping and a critical midterm election next year, only piecemeal measures should be expected.  And we know what those look like. Answering questions about the new 15 percent surcharge this week, Echegaray said Argentines who pay in pesos for packaged tours to go abroad wouldn’t have to pay the fee “yet.”  Daniel Politi is a freelance writer living in Argentina.
Argentina's new tax on credit-card purchases abroad is an excuse for the government to scrutinize travelers' financial records.