THE PUTARURU PRESS. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1928. OTHER PAPERS’ OPINIONS. UNFAIR TAXATION.

Putaruru Press, Volume VI, Issue 224, 16 February 1928, Page 4

THE PUTARURU PRESS.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1928. OTHER PAPERS’ OPINIONS. UNFAIR TAXATION.

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It is difficult to imagine any reason why, at this stage in the Dominion’s development, absolutely essential domestic appliances should be heavily taxed, but it is utterly preposterous that there should be discrimination in the tax as between gas and electricity. The chairman of the Auckland Gas Company says that such things happen only in “ half-civilised countries.” They certainly would not happen in civilised countries whose people are thoroughly wide awake. For it must not be thought that the evil ends with the injustice. It ends there so far as the victims of discrimination are concerned, but not so far as the community is concerned. The community has to pay, and does pay heavily, for the inefficiency which is encouraged as often as an industry or trading concern is sheltered from the full blast of competition. Gas companies continue to make profits, and to make them without robbing the public, because they must do so or cease to exist. Many of the trading concerns of the State and of the municipalities would actually be losing money if they were compelled to stand wholly on their own feet, and they remain in business, whether we realise it or not, because they are being subsidised in two or three directions by the public. The public pay their taxes for them, they pay for most of their goodwill, and they also and especially pay for their faulty and costly methods.—Christchurch Press.