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NEWS: The Apothecary Diaries Manga Artist Nekokurage Pleads Guilty to Tax Evasion


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Emerje



Joined: 10 Aug 2002
Posts: 7424
Location: Maine
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 5:49 am Reply with quote
Quote:
Nekokurage was indicted by The Fukuoka Regional Taxation Bureau on February 29 on suspicion of not declaring approximately 260 million yen (about US$1.6 million) in income and evading about 47 million yen (about US$298,887) in taxes from 2019-2021. According to the National Tax Bureau, the tax-evaded money, which includes income earned from manga sales, was used to purchase real estate.

I honestly had no idea manga artists could make that kind of money in a three year span. Is this normal? And that's just for an adaptation, I've always thought of manga adaptation artists as being on a lower rung compared to original creators (be it a single writer/artist or a duo) since they're likely assigned by a publisher and are happy to do whatever work they can get without much room to negotiate. I guess I wasn't prepared for those numbers.

Emerje
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WANNFH



Joined: 13 Mar 2011
Posts: 1864
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 7:59 am Reply with quote
Emerje wrote:
I honestly had no idea manga artists could make that kind of money in a three year span. Is this normal? And that's just for an adaptation, I've always thought of manga adaptation artists as being on a lower rung compared to original creators (be it a single writer/artist or a duo) since they're likely assigned by a publisher and are happy to do whatever work they can get without much room to negotiate. I guess I wasn't prepared for those numbers.
Well, even for an adaptation during that time The Apothecary Diaries manga was kinda huge bestseller even when the top was covered by nothing but Demon Slayer and JJK, considering during that time frame it already reached >5M combined sales with LN (and now it's approximately 7 times more).

It's maybe not sound as standard, but ~1.6M USD of income for three years seems completely fair for a hit manga.
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Kadmos1



Joined: 08 May 2014
Posts: 13626
Location: In Phoenix but has an 85308 ZIP
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 9:39 am Reply with quote
I get that most people in the world despise paying taxes. Morally and ethically taxes might be questionable, but it is a legal thing in many jurisdictions. How much one should pay and what they should be taxed on are also concerns.
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Emerje



Joined: 10 Aug 2002
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PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 10:12 am Reply with quote
WANNFH wrote:
It's maybe not sound as standard, but ~1.6M USD of income for three years seems completely fair for a hit manga.

No doubt, but we all know how unfair the industry tends to be outside of the really heavy 20+ year hitters. Knowing that someone drawing an adaptation made nearly $2 million over 3 years is an unexpected success story that makes me wonder just what kind of bank NEW successful original creators are making.

Emerje
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Minos_Kurumada



Joined: 04 Nov 2015
Posts: 1193
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 10:18 am Reply with quote
Emerje wrote:
Quote:
Nekokurage was indicted by The Fukuoka Regional Taxation Bureau on February 29 on suspicion of not declaring approximately 260 million yen (about US$1.6 million) in income and evading about 47 million yen (about US$298,887) in taxes from 2019-2021. According to the National Tax Bureau, the tax-evaded money, which includes income earned from manga sales, was used to purchase real estate.

I honestly had no idea manga artists could make that kind of money in a three year span. Is this normal? And that's just for an adaptation, I've always thought of manga adaptation artists as being on a lower rung compared to original creators (be it a single writer/artist or a duo) since they're likely assigned by a publisher and are happy to do whatever work they can get without much room to negotiate. I guess I wasn't prepared for those numbers.

Emerje


In Bakuman they give the numbers in Shounen Jump, its a lot if you get a top series, at least 2 characters bought Lamborghinis and irl Rumiko Takahashi is always mentioned as one of the richest women in Japan.
-----------

A shame such hero got caught, I personally always help people to evade for free.
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tinyirnfist0



Joined: 13 Oct 2021
Posts: 45
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 2:58 pm Reply with quote
^

Are you kidding? Because that kind of thing will land you in jail.
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Minos_Kurumada



Joined: 04 Nov 2015
Posts: 1193
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 3:26 pm Reply with quote
^

If my government was competent enough to catch me then there wouldn't be need for evasion to begin with.

I think I have been evading for 20 years and counting.
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WANNFH



Joined: 13 Mar 2011
Posts: 1864
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 4:58 pm Reply with quote
Emerje wrote:
No doubt, but we all know how unfair the industry tends to be outside of the really heavy 20+ year hitters. Knowing that someone drawing an adaptation made nearly $2 million over 3 years is an unexpected success story that makes me wonder just what kind of bank NEW successful original creators are making.
Oh, it's pretty safe to say there the authors who made it big are cash-loaded, it's more like 95% of the industry are cannot breach the numbers and are on low side.

But considering even the adaptations of successful LN - now if you think that Nekokurage made over 1.5M USD even when the sales of manga were not even at prime and that was years before the TV adaptation that skyrocketed the numbers, now think how much from the splits have Taiki Kawakami, the artist of TenSura manga - which is literally the biggest current hit of Kodansha on manga side.
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NeverConvex
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Joined: 08 Jun 2013
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PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 5:13 pm Reply with quote
WANNFH wrote:
]Oh, it's pretty safe to say there the authors who made it big are cash-loaded, it's more like 95% of the industry are cannot breach the numbers and are on low side.


Yeah, I think this is likely it -- although, I really suspect it's way more uneven than this 95% suggests. Manga (/books/acting/etc) has an economic model similar to sports: there are only so many eyeballs, but given the ability of modern tech to transmit their work to billions of people, the industry can easily be dominated by a small number of people perceived to be 'the best' at their craft. In a setup like this, I generally expect the top incomes will take home really outsized percentage of overall profits, and the top incomes are almost completely uninformative about the median person's income in the industry.
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Emerje



Joined: 10 Aug 2002
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Location: Maine
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 5:25 pm Reply with quote
Minos_Kurumada wrote:
In Bakuman they give the numbers in Shounen Jump, its a lot if you get a top series, at least 2 characters bought Lamborghinis and irl Rumiko Takahashi is always mentioned as one of the richest women in Japan.

No doubt, but that's why I clarified in my second post I'm talking more about new talent and adaptations which are typically contracted out by a publisher rather than a creator.

Emerje
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Meexa



Joined: 13 Mar 2016
Posts: 224
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 8:19 pm Reply with quote
I forget the term/lingo for this. But to my understanding, if you just add up the sales from 20ips within a specific industry. Those top 20 IPS will make up at least 2/3rds of the revenue.

So if you reach best seller once, I wouldn't be surprised you would be making bank.
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MFrontier



Joined: 13 Apr 2014
Posts: 14253
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 10:09 pm Reply with quote
To be a mangaka or to file taxes...although it's kind of funny how the actual Apothecary Diaries author got involved by telling them to "talk to a tax accountant."
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LegitPancake



Joined: 26 Jun 2017
Posts: 1311
Location: Texas, USA
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 10:37 pm Reply with quote
What I don’t understand is why they (she?) are still in trouble. It says they paid all taxes and fees they owed in 2022, so what is there left to be prosecuted for?
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tsog



Joined: 16 Sep 2017
Posts: 265
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 10:43 pm Reply with quote
Meexa wrote:
I forget the term/lingo for this. But to my understanding, if you just add up the sales from 20ips within a specific industry. Those top 20 IPS will make up at least 2/3rds of the revenue.

You mean Pareto Principle?


Never though I'd find people openly advocating breaking tax laws on ANN.
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Meexa



Joined: 13 Mar 2016
Posts: 224
PostPosted: Sun Jun 02, 2024 11:43 pm Reply with quote
tsog wrote:
Meexa wrote:
I forget the term/lingo for this. But to my understanding, if you just add up the sales from 20ips within a specific industry. Those top 20 IPS will make up at least 2/3rds of the revenue.

You mean Pareto Principle?


Never though I'd find people openly advocating breaking tax laws on ANN.


Ah yes that is it, thank you. It is the Pareto Principle.
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