CONSCRIPTION OF WEALTH

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3169, 21 August 1917, Page 6

CONSCRIPTION OF WEALTH

Sir,—Tho Government have expressed tho view that they were not in favour o5 tho conscription of wealth, but ■ aiter perusing their land and income tax proposals I consider that at any rate thejare conscripting the wealth of one class of the community, and that is of the landowners, and especially the large landowners. I am only" a small landowner myself, and quite willing to pay my share to help to win this war, and if it is necessary to conscript wealth, why not make all classes of the commnniiy pay their fair share? As fax as I c.;t\ see, the farmer is being made to bent the brunt of it. He is certainly the milch cow of New Zealand. Sir Joseph Ward says if there any impression that thelarge landowner was getting off too Lghl* ly, that impression was entirely tv'.cng. Never in tfie history of the Dominion, had the large landowner l>een asked to pay anything like what he was being calf* led upon to pay under the Budget pro* posals. Quite so. But what I want t» know is why the other wealthy capitalists who are not landowners are not lex-' ed on their capital as well as their* income the same as the landowner? Wβ will say two men arrive in New Zealand ten or twenty years' ago. Each has the I sum of .£50,000 for investment. One will: invest his capital in land and etart producing eheep, wool, cattle, etc., which: help to make np the exports of the Eo~ minion. Now he is taxed on the i-come-he derives from his land, and also on his , - capital invested in the land from Id. to 7d. in the pound on the unimproved value (he is not even allowed to deduct his mortgages), and on top of this is added 50 per cent., making his land tax from M. to 10ld. in the pound. Sir Joseph Ward stated that he could tell the . House that some large taxpayers would pay 15s. in the pound in combined taxation under his proposals. If that is rofc confiscation of wealth I don't know what it is. But the point I want to show is how unfair it is to the man who invest* ed his money in land compared to theman who invested in a business—say drapery, wine and spirits, ironmongery,, boot manufacture, or foundrv, or any other mercantile business. He lias simply to pay an income tax, and his capital in untouched. But the farmer has io pay income tax/and in addition a very cerf. siderable portion of his capital as land' tax. If this is what the Government calj equality of sacrifice I fail to see it. I can only call it most one-class taxation,, and I am surprised that some opposition has not been raised to the drastic nature of the tax in the House. The merchant should bo called upon to contribute i!! 3 share of capital tho same as tho landowuer.

i Another point that I think should Tis brnneht nn in the House is that those landowners who have gone to the ftrnt. and put managers on their farms, to fight fnnis for n few shilling n rfav nnd lisle their lives should not be. railed upon fo Day such a heavy tax as tho man whi> lias stopped at home and taken no risk. —I am, etc., FARJtER.