HOW PITT GOT MONEY.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 1211, 10 December 1919, Page 3

HOW PITT GOT MONEY.

SOME NOVEL TAXES. For originality of schemes to replenish, the national exchequer few have rivalled William Pitt. It was ho who devised tho dog tax, an institution which still thrives. He also originated tho income tax, which during his administration waa fixed at 2s in. tie pound on nil incomes exceeding i'iiOll. It was the fashion of his time to wear the hair in a powdered queue, end hair powdered appealed to Pitt as a vanity for which every man would be willing to pay a guinea a year. He expected tho treasury to benefit to the extent of £250,000 annually, but every ouo had his queue cut off. A tax on shopkeepers .although only a small impost arranged on a eliding scale based on the uinount of rental paid, was stoutly resisted and eventually defeated. A tax on'feawJe servants, amounting to 2s Od for one, Cs for two, uhd 10s for three orraore, was more successful, Births,, marriages, and deaths were all made to contribute to the national purse. A duke's bride cost him a trifle over £SO; Ihe arrival of an heir meant a contribution of £3O, and subsequent male additions to the family caeh called for £25. The de.irh of the wife necessitated the payment to the Government of £SO, and smaller sums were payable on the death of other members of the family. These life and death taxes wera assessed on every subject in the kingdom who had anything to pay, the smallest sum collected being for marriage, some 2s 6d, paid by th man whose* income was less than £SO a year. 'this man paid 2s Id each time he became a father, and 4s approximately upon the death of his wife or son. Bachelors, of every rank were taxed from 1005 to 1700, the payments varying with the rank of the individual, and ranging from 5s to £l2 a year. A man oyer, twenty-five and unmarried was a bachelor under tho law.

Two of the most -short-sighted tuxes ever levied were those on paper and oil windows. William 111. originated the paper tax, which at one time was as high a.- £2B a ton. On the paper used by Charles Knight to print his Peniiy Cyclopaedia the" tax amosint-d to £20,000. Later there was imposed a tax of fourpence a sheet on newspapers, with an additional tax of Ss <W on every advertisement.