Sales Tax

Dominion, Volume 38, Issue 4, 29 September 1944, Page 4

Sales Tax

Sir, —The proposal to subsidize the cost of textiles for clothing in order to reduce the price to the consumers is what one might expect from a Government with as little vision as the present one. The curse of retail prices to the public is the added sales tax. Take the sales tax off, and there would be no need to subsidize. The answer to the proposal to subsidize is not to take money from the War Expenses. Account, but to simply take the sales tax off. The sales tax is the most unjust, unfair, and inequitable tax ever imposed, and the cost to the consuming public much higher than generally understood. When a man buys an article of wearing apparel for, say, 20/-, if. the sale docket was made <>ut by the assistant like this: 1 garment, 16/8; sales tax, 3/4; 20/-; the would-be purchaser would squirm and protest, but have to pay all the same. But as things are now, th/ docket is made out for one garment, 20/-, and thus the sales tax addition is hidden. Thus the obvious answer to the proposal to subsidize to reduce prices, is to take the sales tax off. Mr. Nash would be the last to agree to reduce taxation.—l am, etc. —ITHURIEL. Lower Hutt, September 28.