TAXATION.

New Zealand Herald, Issue XVI, 3 December 1879, Page 6

TAXATION.

TO THE EDITOR. Sib, —Wo have heard much of late of tho heavy weight of taxation on the working man. 'J he late Premier was prone to enlarge on this theme. It has been stated that over £4 per head is paid for every man, woman, aud child. This may be by arithmetic, but is it in fact ? Does a working man with wife and four children pay over £24 in taxation annually ?—about one-fourth of an average income. Any one can determine this by an estimate of his own household expenditure ; noting that bread, meat, vegetables, ic., and (if the working man goes in as he should for local industry) his boots and many other things are free, even to his beer if he drinks it. Tea and sugar are but lightly rated, and how the amount i 3 made out I cannot understand, unless the income is devoted hy patriotic z-al to the consumption of articles upon which the heaviest duties are laid—a most unlikely thing. It seems to me that taxation must fall heavier on property than same of our political agica'.ors would have u*: believe.—l am, &c., E.O.