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I think in general luxury goods taxes are underexploited. People normally want to buy expensive things so they can show off how much money they have. May as wel
by pasabagi 5y ago
I think in general luxury goods taxes are underexploited. People normally want to buy expensive things so they can show off how much money they have. May as well make them more expensive, and divert some of that cash to useful purposes.
- jopsen 5y agoMaybe... My point was that often these taxes are actually targeting imports, and not necessarily "luxuries". Well, that also depends on how you define luxuries :) I personally don't mind taxes, but consumption taxes, even on "luxury items" are generally likely to be regressive in nature. So maybe don't use them...
- pasabagi 5y ago>likely to be regressive I'm not sure. I was just looking for some points of comparison, and as far as I can gather, tampon tax (the standout example for regressive luxury taxation) wasn't actually a luxury tax, but rather a tax on 'unnecessary' items. Which is - ech - but, you know, it's not an extra tax. I think explicit taxes on higher-price items within categories (so like, expensive cars) would be kinda nice, because it avoids all of the fiddly questions over what is and isn't an luxury item.
- mr_toad 5y ago> May as well make them more expensive, and divert some of that cash to useful purposes. It’s very easy to wipe out an entire market by over taxing it, and lose not only the luxury tax, but also all the normal taxation. Not to mention all the black and grey market activities you incentivise.