A TAX ON BACHELORS.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1213, 5 August 1884, Page 3

A TAX ON BACHELORS.

A rival of Major Atkinson on the subject of national insurance has arisen in South Australia, in the person of Mr Reed, the Chairman of a Commission which has been sitting there to enquire into the question of destitution. Mr Reid proposes to place the task of providing for distitution, old age, and sickness, altogether on one class of the community. • There is a beautiful simplicity about his plan, which is simply to tax every 7 young man between the ages of 17 and 25 the sum of 3s per week one shilling to go to the support of the destitute, and the other two towards providing for old age and sickness. Tiiis tax he would hold employers responsible for. The details of Mr Reed s scheme have not yet reached us, but as it is not likely to be carried out, it does not matter. We do not know whothei Mr Reed proposes to exempt married men or whether hit tax was intended to act as an incentive to maimgm Me '.v oider that amongst the innumerable remedies which have lately been pi escribed tor reliet of our depressed condition —extending from the establishment of a Bank of Issue to the institution of Protection—no one has ever revived this idea and called on the Colonial Treasurer to put a tax on bachelors. As this is leap year the time would of course be most appropriate. Post.