Iceland is full of surprises.

A land sparsely settled. Not as much ice as you would expect. An austere rugged beauty. Reykjavik, the capital, is a pleasant small city, on the sea, with some fine restaurants and good bars. The nightlife starts late and is well marbled with some very fine looking woman.

Should you be lucky enough to meet one, there is an increased chance that she may be wealthy as well. Things are good and getting better in Iceland. The WSJ has noticed.

ICELAND: NORDIC TIGER

The rags-to-riches story of how Iceland's 300,000 citizens became some of the world's wealthiest people is a testament to capitalism's animal spirits. Only after it opened up the economy, privatized state companies and slashed marginal taxes did this once famine-plagued island become a Nordic Tiger, says the Wall Street Journal.

Happily, the government can't seem to get enough of a good thing. It convened a special task force in 2005 to look into ways of transforming Iceland into a financial hub. Headed by Sigurdur Einarsson, chairman of Kaupthing, the country's biggest bank, the committee recommended in November that the corporate-tax rate be reduced to 10 percent from the current 18 percent.

In fact, the benefits of low taxes are already on full display in Iceland, which provides an almost perfect demonstration of the Laffer Curve, says the Journal:

From 1991 to 2001, as the corporate-tax rate fell gradually to 18 percent from 45 percent, tax revenues tripled to 9.1 billion kronas (U.S. $135 million in today's exchange rate) from just above 3 billion kronas (U.S. $44.5. million).
Since 2001, revenues more than tripled again to an estimated 33 billion kronas (U.S. $490 million) last year.
Personal income-tax rates were cut gradually as well, to a flat rate of 22.75 percent this year from 33 percent in 1995; meanwhile, the economy averaged annual growth rates of about 4 percent over the past decade.
But Iceland's tax competition isn't sleeping, says the Journal:

In addition to Eastern Europe's flat-tax movement, there is healthy rivalry from Switzerland, where individual cantons (territorial districts) can set their rates independently.
Even Germany, once critical of tax-cutting, recently announced that it will cut its corporate-tax rate to just below 30 percent next year from the current rate of about 38 percent.

Source: Editorial, "Iceland's Laffer Curve," Wall Street Journal, March 8, 2007.