I found an article about First Nations Taxation by apihtawikosisan. In the article he gave lots of information about who and why some First Nations have to pay taxes and some don’t. The tax exemptions that do exists are only linked completely to the reserves. So non-Status Indians, Inuit, Métis, and most Status Indians living off reserve, don’t get any tax exemptions at all. For those who do not have to pay taxes it only applies to the goods that are purchased off reserve and are delivered to the reserve by the retailer’s official agent are tax exempt. If a Status Indian wants to transport goods back to the reserve, then legally they are not exempt. Taxes on meals, movie tickets, and a host of other things that couldn’t conceivably be brought back to the reserve are also not tax exempt. Services provided on reserve are tax exempt.
I do agree with this article because everyone just gets the wrong impression of First Nations because of the fact that some of them do not have to pay taxes on some things. The fact that only the First Nations living on a reserve get this tax exempt is more reassuring because in that case it is only fair. Most of the time, those who live on the reserve have little, if not no money. Those who are eligible to pay taxes should. It is something that everyone has to do. I feel as if this has changed my point-of-view on First Nations because most people judge or consistently complain about them because of this whole taxation situation. I have nothing against First Nations and I 100% agree with this article.
I think that the First Nations should have a chance to make it more clear with the public about who, why and how some of these people don’t have to pay taxes because in my opinion a majority of people either don’t know any of this or they just assume that they don’t have to pay taxes. It is more so a stereotype than anything. It isn’t fair to those First Nations that do pay taxes and do pay for everything everyone else does are getting judged because of what people are thinking/assuming about them. Again, I completely agree with everything this article had said.
Source : http://apihtawikosisan.com/2011/12/first-nations-taxation/
Rebecca Perigny 