I’m sure this is the question most tax payers have in mind over the proposed oil cess on income tax. Agreed that crude oil has touched $135 and the increase in the price needs to be passed on to consumers. But pass it on to the ‘consumer’, not the tax payer alone. Anyway, the price of petrol consists of heavy duties necessary for funding the government. Why can’t the duties be reduced? The budgeting would have been done keeping in mind an absolute number in mind. Now that the base has changed, why can’t the percentage of duty be reduced so as to maintain the same absolute number? Why is the government pretending to subsidize when the reality is that it gets greedy every time the base price changes (duties keep going up in the same proportion).
And, the big question is why can’t they just increase the price of the commodity for the consumer? Why burden the tax payer? Well I guess I know the answer - to appease the ‘poor’, majority voter! How long will we be penalized for creating wealth?
on Jul 27th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
Q: “Well I guess I know the answer - to appease the ‘poor’, majority voter! How long will we be penalized for creating wealth?”
A: Eternity. I would only presume that the world is ‘no more’ if your great great great great grand child is not posing the same question after 50 years.