Sin Taxes are Anti-Poor - PCART

PEOPLE’S COALITION AGAINST REGRESSIVE TAXATION (PCART)

PRESS STATEMENT

9 October 2012

SIN TAXES ARE ANTI-POOR!

NO TO SIN TAX!

The so-called sin tax bills pending before the Senate will affect the poor more rather than the rich. These are Senate Bills 2763 (Excise Tax on Alcohol Products) and SB 2764 (An Act Restructuring Excise Tax on Tobacco Products). According to government officials the sin tax bills aim to increase taxes on liquor and cigarettes in order to raise more funds to finance the government’s Universal Health Care program. If these bills are enacted into law, it will greatly affect the livelihood of thousands of families of tobacco farmers, cigarette workers and even small ambulant vendors and takatak (cigarette vendors). 

The government may argue that these sin tax bills are forms of its direct intervention to address the issues concerning the declining state of health of the people. Is this really about health? PCART finds this highly dubious knowing the dismal performance of the Department of Health (DOH) and the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (Philhealth). The recent moves of the government to privatize government hospitals and partner with the private sector to build the main office of the Philhealth is sufficient enough to claim that health services shall no longer be accessible to the poor even if all the proceeds from these sin taxes are directed to the DOH and Philhealth.

For the poor, this is not about health. More so, this is about their livelihood. For them, it is more important to earn a living even if this may only be diminutive, rather than to die of hunger. If these bills became laws, these will be considered as a form of regressive taxation because it imposes a greater burden on the poor and threaten their livelihood. Furthermore, the concerned government agencies and even the draft bills have no mention of an alternative livelihood plan for the affected farmers and workers.

We are against sin tax bills because this means loss of jobs and other means of livelihood but more importantly it will greatly contribute to the widening gap of have and have nots in our country .