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Wednesday, March 14, 1973
In addition, he urged the Government to consider invoking
a business profit tax,
"Why should a salaried teacher or technologist pay tax and
another person, a share operator, be exempt from profit tax?" he asked.
When a person made a few investments in a year, he or she was
not in business but when that person regularly and habitually bought
and sold shares, he said, the persons was clearly making a profit
arising out of such a business.
Moreover, when certain amahs were making more in a few months
than a whole year's earnings of technologists and teachers, "it is
demoralising to the professionals and will have far-reaching effects on
the productivity of Hong Kong," he added.
Stricter Control
The frenzied speculation by both large and small investors,
he continued, had created an atmosphere of "wholesale gambling" in
Hong Kong with the result that the attention of workers from
domestic servants to company managers was being diverted from
productive facilities in industry and business.
"A stricter control of the stock market operations is imperative,"
he stressed, "and therefore the enactment and passing of the Securities
Bill is now a matter of urgency.
tr
Mr. Wong also called for a high transfer tax to be levied
on land transactions to dampen the land market.
"Many land
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