It was common
knowledge that our government would have to extort more money from us than last
year. That it would increase the effective taxes, levies, duties and other
euphemisms for theft by so much was a surprise. This year’s Budget has revealed
that citizens will cough up an extra R137bn. Much of it with new and
higher stealth taxes. The increase in the VAT rate as well as to fuel and booze
levies are particularly nasty. The sugary beverages tax has made a quiet
entrance. The medical tax credit system will receive below-inflation
adjustments to fund national health insurance, but this will be noticed only in
18 months’ time when the 2019 income tax assessments begin to arrive.
This works
out at an average R20 000 more for each of the 7 million or so taxpayers
in the nation. That really is a lot of money for anyone to find and hand over
without much hope of any visible return. Particularly when not very much is
being said or done about reductions on the expenditure side of the budget. For
example, the Budget Review (a 300-page doorstopper of a book) has charts that
show the huge growth in government employee numbers over the past few years but
depict only trivial planned reductions in head counts in the future. There is
not one line in the Review about the possibility of selling off state assets (privatisation
– dread word) to raise the cash so desperately needed. The view from the Union
Buildings is a sea of upturned palms belonging to all the people who have become
conditioned into believing that the government must and will and can provide. Anxiously
watching this show from the side-lines are the investors and savers who have
lent money to the government and are now wondering about the safety of their
capital. Their palms are also open.
This Budget is
the inevitable consequence of decades of retributive and unimaginative
socialist policies increasing state control in all spheres of human endeavour. National
Treasury is deeply concerned that the rich might not be paying their share
towards keeping this leaky tub afloat and seeks on every page to identify these
culprits and punish them. Therefore, the zero-rated VAT status on Rye and low
GI bread has been removed. Cosmetics, electronics (particularly “smart
phones”), golf-balls and motor vehicles are deemed to be luxuries unused by the
poor (really?) and therefore the ad valorem
excise duties on these items are
to be increased “in-line with the progressive tax system”. “Sin” taxes are up. A
rather trivial use of this word considering the crimes that are being committed
with our money. Why do we have to pay
the salaries of the mental midgets who spend their days coming up with this dross?
Adding to the
fear and scepticism that this budget isn’t seizing the real nettle is the
realisation that its modest targets will be attained only if some rather
optimistic economic growth takes place immediately and forever.
A lot has
been said about how well National Treasury has fielded the “hospital pass” lobbed
at them by JZ as he sidled towards the Exit. This was the assurance that poorer
families will not be expected to pay university fees in future. So this year R57bn
will be provided for so-called Higher Education where perhaps 2 million students
spend about 4 years each, studying subjects many of which have limited value
for prospective employers. Meanwhile
just R230bn is allocated for supplying a dozen years of schooling to around 15 million
youngsters. (Amazingly, no one is sure about this number.) Since SA now consistently
comes last in almost every international educational ranking, it should be
clear to everyone that these ratios are wrong. Obviously, the authorities don’t
know how to fix it so maybe that most of the education budget ought to be
returned to the taxpayers to let them decide how to educate their children?
A satisfactory Lions win over the Sharks last weekend will
ensure grumbling at the bowling club bar this evening about who was doing what
wrong. Meanwhile flicking over to watch the Proteas labouring to bowl out the Indians,
there are so many new faces that one feels like a stranger in one’s own
country. Which takes us back to the Budget.
James
Greener
Friday 23rd
February 2018
