THE TAXATION BURDEN

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22830, 14 March 1936, Page 21

THE TAXATION BURDEN

TO THE EDITOR Sir,—The figures quoted in your issue of the I.lth inst.. under the heading of " Taxation Hinder," are indeed thoughtprovoking. Surely they will make people pause and consider why an increasing burden of taxation and debt is necessary necessary not only in our own country but also in every other country, irrespective of their real wealth. No secret is made of the fact that these national debts can never be paid and that eventually it will be impossible to pay even the interest. A form of repudiation will be forced on us. Does this not all confirm tlie contention of Major Douglas that there is a flaw in our monetary system? If it is true, as is staled, that all money originates as a debt,'and that, due to the fact that the debt bears interest, a greater sum than wa« originally borrowed must in every case be repaid, then an increasing burden of debt and taxation is inevitable. Being inevitable it is divinely and humanly impossible to escape this increase, and, unless every country remodels its money system upon entirely new lines, debt and taxation will crush not only the people and their Governments, but civilisation itself. The cable messages tell us that the crisis in Europe to-day is the result not of German and Italian greed and perversity but of economic pressure having driven those people

to the point where they must revolt or break. That war and chaos, which Major Douglas foretold, if we continued with our present money system, are very near.—l am, etc., TAXPAYER. Tapanui, March 12.