The National tribune., 1897-11-04
THE BURDEN OF PEN>ION-PAYING."

are forever pratlng about
Who feels it?
Who is conscious Of it?
Who is ever aware that he is con-
tributing single cent toward discharg
ing the Nations just obligations toward
the veterans?
Let us have some specifications and
data upon, which to base this incessant
groan.
We defy any man TO show where a
single dollar is collected for the purpose
Of paying pensions, or where a single
dollar would or should be taken off the
revenues if the last soldier and soldiers
widow were dead and in his or her grave.
Last year the Government collected
through the Internal Revenue Bureau
S14G,S30,615.06, or several millions
more than it disbursed for pensions.
These taxes are imposed and main
tanned for the purpose of regulating the
manufacture and sale Of the articles
taxed, and not primarily for the pur-
pose of revenues. All the world agrees
that liquors, tobacco and oleomargarine
should be taxed, and substantially no
one in this country wants the taxes made
any lower. No later than last week the
Committee for Free Alcohol met with an
energetic remonstrance against cheapen-
Ing whisky from a source where it was
least exrected-the druggists--who rep
resented that cheaper alcohol meant a
degradation of public morals.
Let US analyze this burden" little
farther:
The s146,S30,615.O6 collected from
Internal Revenue last year was finally
paid by the men who drank the beer
and whisky, smoked the cigars, and ate
the oleomargarine.
But for every dollar of their money
which finally went into the Treasury
and was used to pay pensions, they paid
from 50 to $40 to the retailers of those
articles. They would probably have
gotten none of them cheaper if there
had been no tax, and their money, in
stead of going into the Treasury, would
have helped swell the profits Of dis
tillers, brewers, tobacco manufacturers,
and makers Of bogus butter.
For example:
The tax on spirits was $1.10 a
gallon. a gallon Of spirits will make
more than a gallon of 'whisky-say, a
gallon and an eighth. In one and one
eighth gallons there are IA fuid-ounces.
A fuid-ounce is a good sized dram for
anybody but hardened topper. If we
call the average price at the bar 10
cents drink, we find that the whisky
drinkers paid the bar-keepers s14.40
for every sl.1O the Treasury received
for the tax on spirits.
The tax on beer was 81 for barrel Of
80 gallons. A barrel Of beer contains
about 500 glasses. Everywhere the
price of beer is D cents glass. There
fore, for every 81 which the beer
drinkers paid into the Treasury, they
paid the saloon-keepers s25.
The tax on cigars is SO per 900.
Assuming that the price of cigars is five
cents apiece, smoker would have to
buy 333, or something like one day
for year, and pay the cigar dealer
$1,000, before he contributed 81 to the
Treasury for the payment of pensions.
The tax on cigarets is 80 cents pei
1000 Therefore, a man or boy had tc
poison the air with 1000 of the pesti
lential little things, and pay the dealer
$40. before he contributed 81 to the
Treasury.
The tax on oleomargarine is two cent?
q pound. 1t retails for from 10 TO l.
cents pound when sold for what it is
Therefore, man had to buy at least 81
pounds of bogus butter, and pay tn,
dealer from So to $3.50, before con
tributing 81 to the Treasury.
BY taking these figures. anyone cal
readily figure out for himself just hoy
much of the burden +" he is bearing.
He must remember all the time tina