Editor:
All agree that the HST is a VAT, value-added tax.
In layman’s terms, it is a sales tax.
All sales taxes are regressive. A regressive tax affects wealthy and poor, or less-wealthy, people in opposite ways.
According to the dictionary, “in terms of individual income and wealth, a regressive tax imposes a greater burden on poor than on the rich – as there is an inverse relationship between the tax rate and the taxpayer’s ability to pay, as measured by assets, consumption or income.”
In plain English, that means that regardless of rate of the HST – whether the current 12 per cent or the supposed change to 10 per cent – those with less income are affected worse by a regressive tax, a sales tax or value-added tax, than those with greater income.
That alone should give all who want our society to be fair to those with less income pause before deciding to retain a tax that will hurt the poor more than rich, but will tax all of us on more goods.
Food for thought. Based on fact, not emotion.
Steven Faraher-Amidon, Surrey