Originally Posted by galvestonangel
Originally Posted by cattailsquilts
To all the Americans on here, the comments about the various countries V.A.T. (Value Added Taxes) are a HUGE reason why we DON'T want Obama's VAT proposal to go through! We love our comparatively inexpensive fabric prices, but if that VAT tax passes, then our prices will jump tremendously as well, and it won't just be our fabrics, it will be our threads, needles, machines, everything.
Not to make this political, but I just wanted to throw that out there as a warning that we'll be headed the same way soon...
What do we need to do? Write our congressman?
Those countries have VAT added to each sale INSTEAD of other "fees" and taxes we pay here in the USA.
Let's say the people in Germany pay 20 % VAT, I pay 9 % sales tax (the same animal) here in the USA.
These fast and angry responses to tax policies just won't cut it.
The USA spends more on the military than any other country on earth. More than the next 7 highest military spenders on our beautiful (not yet completely destroyed) planet.
(All told, military spending, not war spending, accounts for between 50 and 60 % of the US budget.)
What you call all those "tax payer donations" is highly irrelevant. In the end, the same people pay (guess who). You need to compare spending on the tax payers' dimes if you want to come up with a rational comparison.
This also applies to prices in Australia and the USA. If the wages are generally higher than the prices can be higher.
Direct comparisons between countries are just not rational. A person who makes US$ 20,000/year in the USA has to scrap by. An Indian getting the same salary on the other hand lives like a king on the Rupies equivalent to US$ 20,000.00.
Let's not compare steak and peanuts.