LETTERSTO THE EDITOR

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3162, 14 August 1917, Page 6

LETTERSTO THE EDITOR

WAR LOAN AND DEATH DUTIES Sir,—lt has bcuii proposed that as deatii duties, estate, aim suueessien, come due. hum the estates of deceased per.sona, luo executors should liuvu tne right to pay. tliem witli tlie recent War Loan stuck if they Hold it. -i'ossibiy tuoso urging this do so iu ignoruuee, but whether or no, tho idea is piaelicnil;' ii breacli of trust, and should not bts permitted. The present rather heavy yet entirely equitable scale oi death duties is very similar both in its incidence and its scale to that introduced in England some years ago by Mr. Lloyd George. Tliuugli tho class ot people who pay death duties iu Now Zculaiiu'is similar, and can pay them equally well with the class whom they affect in England, the New Zealand deatii duties were introduced for a .--peoirio purpose, and auy application to another channel of such moneys'is morally a breach of trust, and utterly unbusinesslike.

The present New Zealand death duties were enacted about the time that Sir Joseph Ward was sufficiently well informed and far-seeing to arrange i'or the gift of the battleship New Zealand to the Empire. Moneys from death duties, although perhaps not specially ear-marked or hypothecated to ra\y for the cost o£ tliis vessel, were for that purpose and no other. Tho public of New Zealand were, so advised extensively through the news columns' of the Press of New Zealand. The greater part of the interest and sinking fund on this loan has atill to l>e paid, and it is generally admitted that no class can bear so well and no class can so equitably be charged with the cost of our gift as the people who art fortunate enough to pay death duties. Since that (imo the war has come, and involves infinitely greater' financial obligations and consequent taxation on our nation. This taxation should mainly be borne by the wealthy, who have the most interest in New Zenland, as they have the most to guard, but yet quite equitably even the noorest should contribute, as they also have their interests to safeguard and rights to maintain. War expenditure is an additional liability for which further and different provision must be made. If the death duty moneys are diverted from iheir orinisral purpose, it means finally that the unpaid cost of the battleship "will be mixed ur> with war pxnpnditiire, and nut on the shoulders of'the New 7,<n\- \ land public. Could any actiou be more dishonest? Incidentally, I may sav that the pigment of nfc !en=t n\ery Inrfrn part of the present death duties can py.?ilv t<! nvoWod. 10 uinlrer !inw "much t l '" <Ip"">i=p<l persor.'s »stat» may 1 :( . wnrth. There is a most valuable loophole. =o important Hint T ennnnr. but tMnk if "-as in(pntionallv i>Tovid<»'. Tlie loonhole I rnfor to lins not, I think, fo far been di=povprert by p.t»v Inwyr. unci T would hanllv pxp-ct that a legallr-'-,inp.l nvTiri ™,M very rwrlily w*. it. It is more obvious t" n person who is statistically inclipH.— T etc.. . H. H. THOMPSON. Eealherston, M.C., August S. TAXING THE MUCH-MARRIED Sir,—ln the adjustment of taxation now under consideration of Parliament there are hundreds, nay thousands, who, like myself, are of the opinion that hardly a fail thing is being done by the family man, particularly the large family man. In that regard I,heartily endorse the views of "Father of Nine," Yfhich appeared in to-day's Dominion, and commend it to the notice , of ouir legislators as a very sane and sound airing of a v very Teal grievance. There are shirkers in other phases of life than the military one. I have met dozens of young fellows in my time who have not been ashamed to admit that there was no reason on earth why they should lose their freedom by shackling themselves to a woman. Thereby they wrong themselves (for one must have that sense of jri-ide in his own stock as ho should have of his ancestry), do an injustice to womankind in tlie abstract, and a grievous wrong to the State which cries aloud i'or population. May I be allowed to diverge tor a moment to enlighten the public on a few geographical points they may have forgotten since their school days, viz., (hat, Germany, with her 70,000,000 of population (before the war) is only twice the 'area of New Zealand and Belgium —poor little Selgium—is just a little larger than the Nelson province. That is surely a striking orgument in favour of the full cradle, yet how is the man treated that keeps his cradle full, as against tho man or woman who does not marry, or, if they do, defeat the ends of nature- as though 'twere natural so to do. Up to an income of £425 per annum (hero is a slight allowance made for children up to the number of five, but, strange to say, there is no allowance for any . further children, which indirectly allows one to gather that the State believes that five should be the maximum number of a family in New Zealand. Over and above tho income mentioned there is no allowance at all. That means that if a person has the capacity to earn or derives an income over ,£425. a year he is to be placed on a taxation level with the single man or baby-dodger of equal money-earning capacity, which does not seem to be reasonable or just. Sinco the exemption 6um was fixed the cost of liviDg has advanced from 40 to 50 per cent'., and it does not need my saying that this hits the big family man very hard compared with its effect on the position of the marital shirker. Assuming, for the sake af argument, that a man has risen to the .£425 mark be-, fore the war, and has carried his family along with him in point of standard of living and society; assuming' that, like the writer of Monday's letter, he has a family of nine, would any member of Parliament or trades unionist in Wellington, knowing the rents to be paid end the cost of living in this city, say that he was in clover with £8 10s. per week coming in? Why, there are wharf .labourers,* with little to maintain in the ivay of eocial amenities, who earn over £G ijer week all the year round, and some live in boardinghouses and pay no taxes, at all except the proportion that may come out of their board and residence. Yet for having had the brains or special canacit.y to earn that sum, and at the same, time do his duty by the _ State- in keeping the cradle Ml, a man is to lose all consideration under tlie latter head thai should come to him, no matter what sum per annum he is in-receipt of. for ho is the man that is providing the soldiers of the future, and the mothers of (■he soldiers of the future. I would commend these views to the consideration of the finance Minister, with the recommendation that he should seriously contemplate the special taxation of those who have not undertaken the responsibilities implied in the Biblical injunction to increase and multiply. Let them follow it by increasing and multiplying the amount ;n the war chest.—l am, etc., FAMILY HAN.

August 13.