339
Rs.
2
190
Direct taxation, however, is the least part of the burden which the humble worker is called upon to bear. Practically the whole of his expenditure is caught within the net of the Customs or Excise duties, his staple articles of food, rice, dholl, flour of all kinds, salt, dried fish, tea, coffee, and oil, every article of clothing for himself and his family, every household implement, his tobacco and, lastly. his rum. What the total amount of his contribution to the Customs revenue may be is difficult to estimate, but covering as it does almost every article of necessary consumption it is obviously much greater in proportion to his total income than that of the more prosperous classes, who pay the same rates of duty. With few exceptions little attempt is made in the Customs tariff to differentiate between rich and poor. Rice, which forms the principal article of diet among the Indian labouring classes, pays a rate of duty which on the imports of 1930 worked out at 4 per cent. ad valorem. Flour. which enters more largely into the diet of other classes, paid 62 per cent. ad valorem, but dholl, another staple article of Indian diet paid 8 per cent. ad valorem. Coffee, which is peculiarly a drink of the more prosperous classes, paid 14 per cent, ad valorem, tea, a drink of more general consumption, 28 per cent. ad valorem. Cotton cloth, the main article of Indian apparel, paid a 12 per cent. ad valorem duty. On a rough estimate it may safely be said that the expenditure of the poorest classes of Mauritius on the main neces- saries of life includes a Customs duty of 7 per cent., or one shilling and fourpence in every pound of expenditure.
When we come to Excise duties the case is even more striking. Of the total Excise revenue, Rs.3,107,500, estimated for the current financial year, Rs.2,250,000 is derived from rum and Rs.850,000 from tobacco. Practically the whole of this revenue from rum comes from the poorest classes of the population, who provide thereby nearly one quarter of the total taxes of the Colony (exclud- ing the sugar export duty which is in the nature of a loan repay- ment rather than taxation). This contribution works out at some- thing in the neighbourhood of Rs.20 per working class family per annum, a result obtained by dividing the total amount of the duty by the figure 110,670 furnished to us by the Census Commissioner as the number of the male adult population of the working classes according to the last census. Like most imposts of this kind it is likely to fall with greatest weight upon the very poor.
There remains the tobacco excise, estimated (after a recent increase in the rate of duty) to produce a revenue of Rs.850,000 for the current year.
Dividing this duty by the number of the adult population of both sexes an average contribution per head of Rs.3.50 is arrived at, which justifies an estimate of at least Rs.2 per working class family.
On the lowest estimate, therefore, it would appear that the average contribution to Government revenue made by the humblest grade of workers in Mauritius is as follows:-
House tax Water-rate
191
Customs (7 per cent. on Rs.300 expenditure on
imported food and clothing)
Excise :
(a) Rum
(b) Tobacco
Total
ུམས ཏྠ རྒྱཨ
47
This figure, which works out at slightly less than 12 per cent. of the total estimated family income of Rs.400-which, as we have already indicated is an outside estimate of the average working class income clearly disposes of any question of increased taxation so far as this class of the population is concerned.
Taration of lower middle classes.
11. The clerical classes are mainly recruited from the Indian and Creole sections of the population. Retail shopkeeping is very largely in the hands of the Chinese. No materials are available from which to construct a reliable estimate of the earnings of the smaller mercantile classes, but their outward style of living is not such as to suggest that they are in a superior economic position to that of the better-paid commercial clerk or junior Civil Servant. A fair indication of the share contributed by the lower middle classes generally to the taxation of the Colony may be gained, therefore, by examining the case of a Civil Service clerk on a salary of Rs.2.400 per annum, and that of a more senior Civil Servant on a salary of Rs.4,000. The particulars cited were furnished to us from a Civil Service source and we were advised that the statements could be taken as representative.
The first case is that of a clerk of about 25 years of age with a wife and two children. His expenditure was said to be as follows:-
Contribution to Widows and Orphans Pension
Fund
Rent Rs.40 per month
Railway or bus fares
Servant Rs.10
Washerman Rs.8
Rs.18 per month
Rs.
96
480
120
}
216
1,080 200
60
60
88
Total
2,400
Food and petty household expenses including
water and lighting
Clothes
Education of children
Doctors' and chemists' bills
Sundries
!
PUBLIC RECORD
OFFICE
Reference -
TETTTT
C.O.882/12
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