Not exactly. Here in Aus., in Canada and in Europe it is a 'goods and
services tax' - we call it the GST. That means that we have a 10% tax
levied not only on all goods except unprocessed foods but also on any
service - such as paying a plumber or hairdresser. This replaced
federal sales taxes on goods of varying rates which could be as high
as 22% (as I remember) on luxury (unecessary) goods like cameras but
was zero on food and books and similar good 'goods'.
The principle was that in a tertiary, service based economy, we could
no longer operate without taxing services.
I am puzzled by some of your claims - giving the federal rate as 28%
and then 42% for instance. I can't imagine murkins accepting 42% plus
state taxes on top. Is there not a progressive taxation system there
where those on minimum wage pay virtually no tax and the feelthy rich
taking a bigger hit? And does not a significant proportion of those
federal income taxes then get redistributed to the states as
recurrent funding and project funding? We have an annual bunfright
here where the states meet with the federal government to try and
increase their proportion of the pie - the large states with smaller
populations get proportionately more so the rest of us complain that
we're subsidising them (and they're quite ungrateful too but it's fair).
If all this is NOT the case, I'd recommend some serious social
protestation. Not at the level of taxation (as usual) but the
distribution of it.
Andrew Fildes
afildes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
On 13/04/2007, at 3:03 AM, Chris Crawford wrote:
> (sales tax is like your VAT tax but the rate is lower, usually
> around 6%),
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