Femke Herregraven
(Dutch, b. 1982)

Taxodus, 2013
Online game
Courtesy of the artist

About Taxodus

Taxodus simulates the unofficial and largely invisible offshore economy that allows international corporations to protect their wealth. Created by Dutch artist Femke Herregraven, the online game asks you to act on behalf of the company of their choice. Your objective is to set up the most efficient tax intermediaries and subsidiaries in countries around the globe in order to lower taxes on your company's profits. Since most of the data behind the game is unavailable to the public, Herregraven views Taxodus as a way for people to gain firsthand knowledge of global tax sheltering. “I could have made a bunch of data visualisations for example but I wanted to make the audience dodge tax themselves,” Herregraven says. “I think by playing you understand more of how companies cut up their legal bodies in order to organize their income most profitably.”

Tip for interacting: The artist has provided a video explaining how to transfer money to entities overseas.