Evening Post. WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 21, 1895 INEQUITABLE TAXATION.

Evening Post, Volume L, Issue 45, 21 August 1895, Page 2

Evening Post. WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 21, 1895 INEQUITABLE TAXATION.

It is an axiom of political finanoe that no Government is justified in taxing the people to a greater extent than is required to meet the necessities of the State. Our present system of raising nearly half our revenue through indirect Customs taxation flagrantly violates this most wholesome and essential prinoiple. The State requires, in round numbers, a million aud a half of revenue, to raise which the people are mulcted to an extent of fully two millions. Such a system of taxation is iniquitous in its injustice. Out of every £1 which the oousumer of dutiable goods has to pay in oonsequenoe of the Customs duties levied by the State on the articles he uses, only some £3 reaches the Treasury and becomes available for expenditure for public purposes. The existence of suoh a leakage between the taxpayer and the Treasury is of itself sufficient to condemn the system under which it ooourg, as wasteful and extravagant. How it ocours was explained in a reoent letter from Messrs KibkCalpte *■ Staihr on the flannelette du.ty, in whioh the principle is oorrcotly stated as fqllows :—": — " Whatever is the price "of the goods landed in the warehouse, " an advance on this net cost must bo " made for the expense of selling and " giving a return for the oapital invested." This is perfeotly legitimate and quite intelligible. The duty being added 1o the original oost and charges, the importer charges bis profit on the total. The illustration given by Messrs. Kibkcaldib and Stains is so clear and striking as to be worth quoting :— " We have five oases of " flannelettes, of whioh the invoioed cost at " ths mill is .£IOB 6s 2d, while the charges, " grouped together, amount to £4& 18s 4d. "Of this sum the duty is £U 12s, whioh, " coupled with the trade advanoe of £6 ss, " makes the total inorease through this new " duty .£30 175." If the importer Bolls to a retailer, the latter, of course, adds his trade advance on the total cost to him, and so the consumer has to pay profit upon profit upon the original Bum paid as duty. The price to the consumer rises with every hand the goods pass through in reaching him, and the total increases almost ba rapidly as the prioe of the nails the old arithmetical catch about the nails in a horseshoe. Thus it may be taken that on aooount of Customs duties the oonßumers pay in this colony every year fully half a million of money in exoesß of the sum whioh those duties return to the Treasury. The difference goes legitimately enough into the pockets of middlemen, who, however, would be no worse off if under a more equitable Bystem of taxation they did not reoeive it. If they had not to employ large capital in paying duties they would be enabled either to conduct their business with less oapital, or to use the released oapital in extending their trade in other ways. It is a vioious system of taxation, opposed to a.l sound principles, when a tax extraoti more from the pookets of the taxpayer than the State needs or receives. This is done in regard to the neoessuiesaof life by the present system of Customs taxation. But there are worse and more inequitable featnres than this about that system It does not tax people in proportion to their means and ability to contribute towards the necessities of the State. With marvellous want of logic speoial taxation, by way of penalty, is on the ons hand levied on landholders who are absentees, and on the other hand the hard-working industrious man, who marries and inoreaies the population by begetting and bringing up children, is specially taxed for doing so. Every ohild he has adds to th» taxation he has to bear. He might just as wall be direotly taxed so much per obild ; but what* howl there would be if this were proposed! Yet an infant is no sooner born than its* father, the breadwinner, commences to pay toll upon it. The flannel in whioh its infant limbs are swathed costs him fnlly one-third more than it would do were it not for the duty, and the very feeding-bottle from whioh it probably draws its first sustenanoe has paid toll to the Customs, importer, and retailer, so as to enhance its oost by upwards of one-fourth. The average Customs taxation in New Zealand in 1892 was £3 11s 7d per head of population — man, woman, and ohild. This is what the Customs got: What the oonsumeri paid would be considerably upwards' of £3 per head. Thus a married man with, oay, five ohildren, has to pay upwards of £33 per annum on acoount of Customs taxation, while the single man working beside him, and earning the same wage, gets off for little above £3. Is it any wonder that under suoh a nyitem the marriage and birth rates in New Zealand should both show signs of falling-off? Working men cannot afford to marry and bring up ohildren. How different would it be if the neoessary taxation were lovied on the man's earnings instead of on thenumber of those he has to support out of those earnings, and if that taxation were levied in suoh a form that the whole of what was paid should go to the State to be used for the publio advantage 1

The elimination of tho middlemen's profits on I the original duties would of itself amount to a substantial relief from taxation to the indust'ial classes. We invite the working men and women of the community to refleot on such facts as these, They are of espeoial interest and import to women, who now pos3esß votes. Let them think how different would be their condition— the sooial condition generally— if tho oost of living were reduced some 30 or 40 per cent., and additional months to feed and bodies to clothe were no longer regarded with dread, as adding an intolerable strain on the already severely strainid earnings of the breadwinner. We are euro that the subjeot only needs reflection and examination to awaken and appeal to the intelligence of the industrial population, and to unite them in a firm demand that the present unjust incidenoe of taxation shall cease, and the revenue be, raised by contributions in proportion to means, the necessaries of life being left untaiod. Freetrade and Direot Taxation should be the political watchwords of the future, and no publio man should bo Bupported who would deny these boons to the people. Until they aro oonoeded, the condition of the country will never be as prosperous as it might be mado throngh their operation, and depression, laok of employment, and poverty, will continue to grow day by day and yoar by yoar. If the people would only wake up and demand fisoal reform and sound finanoe in the direotion we have indioated. New Zealand would. soon bask in the full sunshine of prosperity and progress.