Business in brief: Visa can be used for business taxes

Washington companies can now pay state business taxes with Visa credit cards, and MasterCard soon will follow suit, the state’s revenue department said Monday.

For seven years state businesses have only had two credit card choices, American Express and Discover Card.

About one-third of the state’s 142,000 registered businesses use cards to pay taxes, said Mike Gowrylow, a spokesman for the revenue department. But that group pays about two-thirds of all tax payments to the state – nearly $700 million per month – he said. Those include state business and occupation taxes as well as retail sales taxes.

Up to now MasterCard and Visa had insisted Washington state take on the small convenience charge assessed on all card transactions. The state refused to pay that minimal charge, which would have diminished total taxes paid. The two companies changed their minds recently because they were losing business to the competition, Gowrylow said.

Washington

Miles per gallon same as 2005

The average fuel economy of 2006 model year vehicles remained constant compared with last year, the government reported Monday.

The Environmental Protection Agency said in its annual report, based on sales projections provided by automakers, that the estimated average fuel economy for 2006 vehicles was 21 miles per gallon, the same as 2005 models.

Honda Motor Co. had the highest fuel economy rating by manufacturer, 24.2 mpg, followed by Toyota Motor Corp., with a 23.8 mpg average. But both Japanese automakers saw their averages drop from the previous year as they placed more of an emphasis on larger vehicles.

DaimlerChrylser AG had the lowest fuel economy rating – 19.1 mpg – followed by Ford Motor Co., which improved 0.5 mpg to reach 19.7 mpg. General Motors Corp. also showed improvements, posting a 20.5 mpg average, but environmental groups said they were disappointed by overall results.

St. Petersburg, Russia

Brazil leader calls trade talks ‘crisis’

The deadlocked Doha round of trade liberalization talks is “in a crisis,” Brazil’s president warned Monday, as France challenged other groups to match the EU’s offers.

Leaders from the world’s most industrialized nations discussed the World Trade Organization talks with those from developing economies in an effort to re-energize the round, which aims to reduce trade barriers to poor countries but has stalled amid disputes over agricultural subsidies and tariffs.

The United States, Russia, Japan, Germany, Britain, France, Italy and Canada were holding final sessions at the G8 summit with the leaders of five fast-growing economies: India, China, Brazil, South Africa and Mexico. Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, the leader of the post-Soviet Commonwealth of Independent States, and Denis Sassou-Nuesso, president of the Republic of the Congo and chairman of the African Union, were also to participate.