Guns and smokes raise US tax take
By Leslie Gevirtz |
July 16, 2010, Friday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
AMERICANS armed themselves to the teeth and paid through the nose to have a smoke, according to the latest United States government report.
The US federal government collected US$20.6 billion in taxes on alcohol, tobacco, firearms and ammunition in fiscal year 2009, up 41 percent from the previous fiscal year, according to the annual report of the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau.
Part of the US Treasury Department, the TTB credited most of the US$6 billion rise in revenues collected to the increased taxes on the tobacco industry as a result of the Children's Health Insurance Reauthorization Act passed in February 2009.
There was also a spike in tax collection from the sale of guns and ammunition, said the report from the agency that has an annual budget of US$99 million.
In October 2009, firearms and ammunition excise tax collection climbed 45 percent from the previous fiscal year, the greatest annual increase in the firearms tax revenue in the agency's history, the report said. By comparison, the average annual increase for fiscal years from 1993 to 2008 was 6 percent.
A Gallup Poll in early October 2009 said one possible explanation for the surge in gun sales could be that more than 50 percent of Americans who owned guns believed that President Barack Obama would "attempt to ban the sale of guns in the United States while he is president."
Obama signed a law allowing people to bring guns into national parks in February.
The US federal government collected US$20.6 billion in taxes on alcohol, tobacco, firearms and ammunition in fiscal year 2009, up 41 percent from the previous fiscal year, according to the annual report of the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau.
Part of the US Treasury Department, the TTB credited most of the US$6 billion rise in revenues collected to the increased taxes on the tobacco industry as a result of the Children's Health Insurance Reauthorization Act passed in February 2009.
There was also a spike in tax collection from the sale of guns and ammunition, said the report from the agency that has an annual budget of US$99 million.
In October 2009, firearms and ammunition excise tax collection climbed 45 percent from the previous fiscal year, the greatest annual increase in the firearms tax revenue in the agency's history, the report said. By comparison, the average annual increase for fiscal years from 1993 to 2008 was 6 percent.
A Gallup Poll in early October 2009 said one possible explanation for the surge in gun sales could be that more than 50 percent of Americans who owned guns believed that President Barack Obama would "attempt to ban the sale of guns in the United States while he is president."
Obama signed a law allowing people to bring guns into national parks in February.
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