About the U.S. Virgin Islands
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St. Thomas, St. John, and Water Island, along with St. Croix, compromise the primary inhabited U.S. Virgin islands, a Caribbean tourist destination located 1,075 miles east/southeast of Miami which in 1999 hosted nearly 1.7 million visitors.

St. Thomas and St. John are physically distinguished by a rugged mountainous terrain and numerous harbors and anchorages with sandy beaches along the shoreline.  St. Thomas has a land area of 32 square miles, with the town of Charlotte Amalie on it's southern coast.  St. John has a 20 square mile land area, with Cruz Bay it's primary population center.  A history of migration from other Caribbean islands and elsewhere along with migration from the U.S. mainland results in a very diverse ethnic composition for St. Thomas and St. John's 53,600 residents.
The islands were named by Christopher Columbus in 1493.  Settled by Denmark in the 17th Century, they were purchased from the Danish Government by the United States in 1917.

From the 1600's to the 1800's, they were primarily sugar growing, slave holding estates. St. Thomas also served as a key Caribbean transshipment point for commercial trade between the Americas and Europe.
With the decline of the sugar cane demand, the liberation of slaves, and the advent of steam transportation, population growth and commercial trade slowed from the late 1800s to until the 1960's.  Then, spurred by commercial jet travel, a ban on Cuba, and a sustained period of economic growth, the U.S. Virgin Islands experienced rapid tourism investment in the 1960s and early 1970s which resulted in higher per capita income in the Caribbean for it's people.

 

                                                             




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The U.S.Virgin Island is an unincorporated territory of the United States, with local government structure defined by the federal Revised Organic Act of 1954. Virgin Islands internal political affairs are under jurisdiction of a governor elected for a four year term and a unicameral legislative whose 15 members are elected for two year terms.  U.S. federal law generally applies to business.  Local laws are comparable to those enacted by U.S. states.  Judicial power is vested in the U.S. District Court of the Virgin Islands, except where exclusive jurisdiction has been conferred upon the V.I. Territorial Court.

U.S. federal personal and  income tax laws apply to the Virgin Islands residents, but revenues are collected locally and retained in the local treasury.  Federal social security and unemployment insurance laws include: gross receipts (4%), excise (3%), customs duty (6%), property (1.25% of 60% of accessed value), and hotel room (8%).

There are various small business and trade promotion exemptions from the general business tax laws.  Export-related investment activities are encouraged by a unique package of federal and local tax exemptions.  Eligible tax-exempt business include hotels, manufacturing plants, export and distribution services and exempt international financial corporations, including banking, insurance, and foreign sales corporations.  

The basic business infrastructure is similar to many small U.S. urban area.  The Virgin Islands offers a wide range of business services such as accounting, advertising and public relations, printing, data processing, and full legal, architectural and engineering services.  Branches of six major international financial institutions are represented here.  Long distance telephone (and Fax) communications are part of the U.S. domestic network.  The territory is a part of the U.S. Postal Service system.  Transportation links to the U.S. mainland including daily passenger and cargo flights of major U.S. airlines, regular express parcel service, and frequent direct containerized ocean freight arrivals from the mainland.  Additional air and sea passengers and cargo services is provided via Puerto Rico.

A combination of U.S. law, natural beauty, comfortable climate, industrious people, and generous tax and trade incentives have made St. Thomas, St. John and St. Croix a preferred tourism destination and business investment location under the U.S. flag in the Caribbean basin.