house. No. 100 REPORT OF THE TAX COMMISSIONER OF THE Commonwealth of Massachusetts, FOR THE YEAR ENDING December 30, 1875. BOSTON: WRIGHT & POTTER, STATE PRINTERS 79 Milk Street (corner of Federal). 1876. <£ommmtu)caltl) of ittassacljusette. Tax Commissioner's Office, Boston, \ January 19, 1876. / Hon. Charles Adams, Jr,, Tax Commissioner. Sir :—The following Tables exhibit a summary statement of the results of the Corporation Tax Law for the current year Whole amount of Taxes assessed under Chapter 283, Acts of 1865. General list, $1,244,659 70 On Coal Mining, Quarrying and Oil Compan- ies,— May assessments, .... .$1,662 60 November assessments, .... 1,365 77 3,028 27 Aggregate of assessments, .... $1,247,687 97 Taxes of 1875, paid to Jan. 1, 1876,— General list, $1,235,190 71 Under section eight, . 925 50 Taxes of 1875 unpaid,— General list, 1,072 79 Abatements. ..... 8,396 20 . Under section eight, . 2,102 77 51,247,687 97 4 TAX COMMISSIONER’S REPORT. Jan. The following statement exhibits the outstanding taxes of Corporations on the general list, unpaid at the end of last year, and the changes during the year : Taxes of 1870,— Outstanding, Dec. 31, 1874, . $ll5 80 Amount paid in 1875, .... 115 80 Taxes of 1871,— Outstanding, Dec. 31, 1874, . $2,319 49 Amount paid in 1875, .... 1,113 00 Outstanding, Dec. 31, 1875, ..... $1,206 49 Taxes of 1872, Outstanding, Dec. 31, 1874, . $1,478 67 Amount paid in 1875, .... 1,024 36 Outstanding, Dec. 31, 1875, ..... 454 31 Taxes of 1873,— Outstanding, Dec. 31, 1874, . $833 17 Amount paid in 1875, .... 724 50 Outstanding, Dec. 31, 1875, . 108 67 108 67 Taxes for 1874,— Outstanding, Dec. 31, 1874, . $13,077 49 Amount paid in 1875, . 10,810 81 Abatements, . 2,018 53 Outstanding, Dec. 31. 1875, . 248 15 248 15 Taxes of 1875,— Outstanding, Dec. 31, 1875, ..... 1,072 79 Aggregate of unpaid taxes, .... $3,090 41 The amount accruing to the Commonwealth under the operation of the law for the current year, is as follows : From General List Corporations,— Net amount assessed, ......$1,236,263 50 Amount .due to cities and towns, .... 915,039 85 Balance accruing to the Commonwealth : $321,223 65 . 27 From corporations, under section eight, . 3,028 Total amount accruing to the Commonwealth, $324,251 92 1876.] HOUSE—No. 100. 5 Of the amount of tax assessed the present year, the sum of $916,803.40 has been paid, and will be payable under the terms of the law to the various cities and towns of the Com- monwealth. A table is appended, marked "C,” giving the amounts to which each city or town is entitled. As usual, a distribution of that portion of the above amount which had been collected on the twenty-seventh day of November, was made and certified in season to be offset against the amounts due from the cities and towns, on account of the state tax, on the first day of December. The amount collected at that date was . $1,203,244 13 distributed was ..... 901,590 22 The amount retained was ..... $301,653 91 The comparative valuation of the capital stock and real estate of corporations, during the years 1874 and 1875, is as follows In 1874, $235,021,538 00 1875, 239,848,414 00 Excess of 1875, ..... $4,826,876 00 The value of real estate and machinery,— In 1874 $166,712,730 00 1875 170,240,795 00 Excess of 1875, ..... $3,528,065 00 The aggregate excess on which a tax was laid,— In 1874, $84,775,750 50 1875 84,213,632 00 Excess of 1874, ..... $562,118 50 As was anticipated, the increase of real estate and machinery valuation has been small, compared with last year. It is, however, questionable whether there should not actually have been a reduction. Certainly, it is contrary to reason to sup- 6 TAX COMMISSIONER’S REPORT. Jan. pose that the valuation of buildings and machinery, of little or no woi th except for the especial purpose for which they are designed, should increase in value, while no profitable use can be made of them. In fact, the market value of shares declines, while, in many cases, the valuation of the real estate and machinery, which is unavailable and almost worthless except for a use which the share value shows to be unprofit- able, increases. It is probable that the limit of this move- ment has been reached, and that, during the coming year, partly by the necessary reduction of values of plant, and partly by increase share value, a fairer amount of tax will be col- lected under this law, and distributed to the shareholding towns. As heretofore explained, the accounts in this office are necessarily kept by the tax year, which differs from the finan- cial year, for which other department accounts are made up. To harmonize the two, the following statement is given. The whole amount realized by the Commonwealth during the financial year ending December 31, 1875, has been:— From taxes of 1875,— General list distributed, ..... $301,653 91 not distributed, 19,420 02 Mining list, ........ 925 60 $321,999 43 Taxes of previous years, collected in 1875,— General list, ..... $10,824 00 Mining list, ..... 1,000 70 11,824 70 Total amount realized $333,824 13 To harmonize this result with that which ap- pears in the Treasurer’s Report, there should be added, — The amount now in the treasury to be distributed to cities and towns, ...... 14,248 26 Amount received in adjustment of claims, . 1,019 87 Carried forward, $349,092 26 me.] HOUSE—No. 100. 7 ..... Brought forward , $349,092 26 And there should be deducted on account of tax of previous years, $37,369 22 And in adjustments of claims, . 1,126 63 Mining tax account, kept separate, 1,926 20 40,422 05 $308,670 21 Whole amount paid by Coal Mining, Quarrying and Oil Companies during the year ending December 31, 1875, is as follows: Taxes of 1867, $6 72 of 1868, 6 72 of 1869, 6 72 of 1870, 20 72 of 1871, 26 72 of 1872, 53 70 of 1873, 126 70 of 1874, 752 70 sl,ooo 70 Taxes of 1875, 925 50 Aggregate of collections in 1875, . $1,926 20 Whole amount of Mining, etc., taxes, assessed in 1875 : Taxes paid, ......$925 50 unpaid January 1, 1876, . 2,102 77 53,028 27 The whole number of Massachusetts corporations and charters to which my attention has been directed the present year, is .... 1,389 Of this number 20 have been dissolved by the courts or are in process of dissolution, and 92 new corporations have been chartered or organ- ized, leaving as the number of corporations and charters to be reported, December 31, 1875, . 1,369 The authorized net increase of capital in the State during the year is as follows : 8 TAX COMMISSIONER’S REPORT Jan, Authorized by special Act,— New corporations, $3,485,000 00 Under chapter 224, Acts of 1870,— Corporations under section 11, and amendments thereof (86), 5,402,650 00 Certificates of increase of capital by 16 companies, under section 34, 1,053,850 00 $9,941,500 00 Certificates of reduction of capital, under section 35 of same Act (14), $745,800 00 Dissolutions by the supreme judi- cial court, or in process, . 2,010,500 00 2,756,300 00 Net increase, $7,185,200 00 The Board of Appeal was constituted by the appointment of the Hon. George H. Whitney, of the Council, to serve with the Treasurer and Auditor. The Board organized November 10, 1875, by the choice of the Hon. Charles Endicott as chairman, when the first session was held. Since that time, one hundred and twenty appeals by corporations have been heard, with the results indicated in the accompanying Table. There have been some appeals by towns, in nearly all of which the action of the Board was simply to sanction a transfer of credits from one town to another, where all parties were agreed, and the parties for whose stock credit was claimed, were shown to be residents of the appellant towns. Appeals in 1875. Whole number of appeals from taxes of 1874, . 6 from taxes of 1875, . 114 l2O Abatements allowed, .......101 Abatements refused, ....... 6 9 Appeals withdrawn, ....... Appeals continued, ....... 4 l2O 1876.] HOUSE—No. 100. 9 A list of cases considered, with the result in each case, is appended, marked "B.” Bank Tax Act. Whole amount of tax on bank shares assessed, . $1,704,316 28 Of which there was retained by towns, onaccount ofshares owned by residents, .... $607,885 28 And there was paid into the treasury, 1,096,431 00 87Q4,316 28 There was paid into the treasury, on account of taxes of 1875, $1,096,431 00 There was certified due to cities and towns, on account of tax on bank shares owned by residents, for 1875, $441,984 19 To savings institutions, . 395,037 77 To insurance companies, . 29,901 96 To literary, scientific and charitable societies, 21,759 21 And in addition, there is due to cities and towns, on account of claims not fully adjusted so as to admit of a certificate, . 2,110 44 890,793 57 Leaving as a balance for the Commonwealth, . $205,637 43 The accounts of the bank tax are kept in this office for the tax year, and in the Treasury for the financial year. The following statement is made to reconcile the apparent disagreement:— Receipts from bank tax, for the year 1875,have been, $1,096,431 00 There has been certified due from the Treasury on same account, ......