Did anyone read the sports section of The Star yesterday? There was an interesting article written by Rick Westhead called: Hockey tax would solve our arena problems.

Rick talks about how California has a sort of "jock tax" where any non-resident athletes must pay a state tax that is based on the amount of work related time they spend in that state during the period of a year. And California is one of about 20 states that are doing this.

So lets say PlayerA plays for the Maple Leafs but doesn't live in Toronto. He makes $28 million. According to California's jock tax he would be contributing roughly $200,000.

Westhead suggests this money could go a long way in helping to repair some of Canada's 3,000 hockey arenas that are in dilapidated condition.

So why hasn't Canada taken a hint and implemented this type of tax itself? Technically it has and it's known as Alberta NHL Players Tax. It went into effect at the start of the 2002-2003 NHL regular season. What Alberta is essentially doing is charging every NHL player who plays in Alberta 12.5% of their game day salary. This money is then split by the Edmonton Oilers and the Calgary Flames. It isn't a huge surprise that this tax has taken a lot of flak, not unlike most taxes.

The Alberta tax differs from the jock tax in that every player is taxed, not just non-residents. Alberta teams play the most at home so therefore are taxed more than visiting teams. Here is an example of how the tax works taken from the Canadian Tax Foundation: In 2003 Edmonton goaltender Tommy Salo who was set to make about US$3.5 million, will pay over $166,000 in players tax. A non-Albertan goalie like Curtis Joseph (2003) who makes US$8 million will pay about $26,000 or 0.2 percent of his total salary.

So what do you think? Should we implement a form of the jock tax? Or maybe take Alberta's route and implement that across Canada. Or maybe we take the best of both worlds and create something new. I do like Rick Westhead's suggestion in using that tax money to put it back into Canadian Hockey arenas. Or better yet Canadian hockey in general.