When taxes become the sin

The Department of Finance is once again floating the idea of imposing more taxes on “sin products” in order to collect more money to pay for the billions of pesos borrowed by the government to pay for COVID-related medicines and vaccines. Most people would shrug the idea off or accept it as a case of “Not my problem” because they don’t drink alcoholic beverages or smoke cigarettes and tobacco in whatever form.

But the minute people discover that the government’s definition of “sin” also covers products dependent on sugar such as soft drinks, chocolates, confectionaries, etc., watch how they quickly turn red faced and object! Only then does it become “their problem.” Only then do we realize that the government’s definition of “sin” products can be arbitrary and simply justified with a health-related excuse. The government position is “This is for your own good.” Yes and no. While piling on taxes on sin products helps in curbing illnesses related to alcohol, sugar and tobacco, where exactly is the money spent?

The fact of the matter is that COVID-19 and the health crisis it created exposed how little the national government actually invested in the country’s health care facilities and requirements. Only after people started to drop like flies or clog hospitals did we all face the brutal fact that governments past and present had relied on the private sector to cover for the government. That is the greatest sin, to collect taxes but not spend it on the intended purpose or need.

There will surely be another great and heated debate over new taxes to cover the government’s loans and everything seems to be focused on additional taxes on sin products and nothing else. What about alternatives? No, I don’t mean taxing other things or someone else. By alternatives I refer to the proverbial Filipino solution that says: “Kung kapos mag tipid.” All throughout the pandemic, the Duterte administration and its “economic managers” refused to cut back on its Build-Build-Build program. It did not cut back on defense spending, refused to realign the huge budgets for controversial programs such as the NTF-ELCAC (anti-insurgency).

While I heard and read of various private corporation executives voluntarily take salary cuts to help reduce lay-offs, I never heard of officials in government-owned and -controlled corporations submit to salary cuts or give up bonuses. It was quite shocking to discover that many political appointees in government as well as board directorships earned so much more than highly trained specialists in the private sector! While so many of us are either underemployed or holding down multiple jobs or rackets to make ends meet, many political supporters get to stuff government offices with their friends or family members.

We always hear of budget proposals before Congress but never once have government offices or Congress submitted an accounting of expenditures particularly for fuel, vehicles, staff, etc. If citizens are required to file ITRs then it’s about time that government officials be required to submit quarterly accounting of expenses.

The DOF wants to tax sin products but what are they doing to limit the expenditure in government such as the wholesale purchase of high-end vehicles that exceed P1.4 million each? The MMDA and lawmakers keep bellyaching about people who own vehicles but don’t have a garage and park on the streets. Well, excuse us! What about all the barangays and police precincts all over the country that don’t have proper parking areas or “garages” for the barangay captain’s vehicles, their ambulances, their fire trucks and patrol cars?

What about the unregulated use of government aircraft that costs hundreds of millions to purchase, maintain and operate? I wonder what would happen if we set up a call center to take in reports of government officials who spend taxpayers’ money to build themselves their very own private toilets in government offices, buildings, schools and universities and agencies!

The DOF should look around and ask what are essential expenditures versus “economic window dressing” and development projects that many countries have cut back on in recognition of the fact that the priority is people’s lives and safety, not more roads, bridges and that sort of thing are more important. The DOF and the economic managers should stop talking about more taxes and start talking cost cutting, balanced budgeting and getting higher yields in terms of Human Benefit for every peso. Stop borrowing money just because “YOU” won’t be around to get the bill. Filipinos should make “accounting for taxes” a campaign issue. As for the DOF and economic managers, you may not be around to get the bill, but you will surely be remembered and blamed incessantly for sending us back to the dark ages of global debts.

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The Department of Trade and Industry should make an effort to inspect supermarkets not just for price control purposes but to check on various concerns and irritants faced by shoppers. Many of these are at the point of payment where customers see so many check-out counters but never enough cashiers on duty. Yes, there has been a lot of lay-offs but when the lines and customers pile up because there are only four out of 20 lanes open, that is bad management.

On top of that is the policy where supermarkets have a 2-to-1 ratio between cash lanes versus credit card. The world is already shifting to cashless transactions for medical and security reasons but in the Philippines, supermarkets are promoting and preferring cash versus card. Last but not the least is the absence of special lanes for bulk or volume purchases such as shoppers buying for their sari-sari stores or their restaurants. Imagine being stuck behind a shopper with two carts full of merchandise and you only have less than 10 items to pay for! Even the Senior Citizen lanes have been taken over and no one seems to be doing anything about it!