STATE TAXATION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23118, 18 February 1937, Page 7

STATE TAXATION

CONTRIBUTIONS BY FAMILIES AVERAGE OF £76 (Communicated by the Associated Chambers of Commerce.) Most taxpayers are fully aware that the usual figures relating to the amount of taxation paid per head of New Zealand’s population are not effective as an index to the real amount paid by each individual. It is obvious that figures d national taxation, when expressing that taxation as an amount per head of the whole population must inevitably take in men. women and children; the wage-earner but also his dependents; tire employed, but alsc the unemployed, the pensioners the infirm, the prison population and those either too young or too old to be breadwinners For that reason, many people ai’e well aware that they are actually paying, in direct and indirect taxation, considerably more than the estimated amount of £l9 3s taxation per head of population for the current finan cial year. The taxpayer consequently makes some conjectures as to the real amount of taxation he pav? directly and indirectly. It is, of course, impossible to get very far along this line. It is easy enough to sort out the fact that out of the whole of the Dominion’s population only 64,000 (1934-35 figures) pay income tax, but then everybody nays indirect taxeswhich produce by far the greates' revenue. It is a step nearer, how ever, to express total national taxa tion in terms of the contribution made by *tie average family of four persons. The followin,' table, oyer the whole population, and covering a period of years, is drawn up on that basis:—

Naturally, these figures are average; one family will pay more and another less. Certain of the taxation is direct and certain indirect. To the figures in the above table are to be added local body taxation, which was equivalent to £ls *ls per average family in 1934-35. The reason for the considerable increases in national taxation is, of course, increased Government expenditure, which, for the current financial year, is equivalent to £lO5 15s per average family._ in ther words, national expenditure (from ordinary revenue and loan moneyl is now at the rate of over £2 per family per week. A prominent State official recently contended, in an address. that high expenditure and high taxation created various social benefits through the redistribution of income which they effected, but taxation which reaches an average of £76 per family is indefensible, tt has become uneconomic and unjust.

TAXATION PER FAMILY Year, Amounts. 1929-30 £52 14 3 1930-31 50 8 4 1931-32 ...... 45 17 10 1932-33 51 10 10 1933-34 55 14 3 1934-35 63 14 3 1935-36 65 3 1 1936-37 *76 16 4 * Estimated.