Taxation and business opportunity.

"We'll tax the hell out of it and make those people pay through the nose!" is a battle cry I have heard from time to time.

Yeah, right.

The entire moonshine industry is based on taxation. 

Moonshine is nothing more or less than untaxed liquor ranging in quality between total rogut and damned good hootch depending on the maker. I would imagine that if the tax on a bottlle of spirits dropped the moonshine industry would take a pretty good hit.

Sometimes I wish I knew which stump to put a couple bucks on, but I don't. The hootch I tasted at deer camp a while back was damned good stuff, as smooth as silk.

Americans hate paying taxes but, of course, it is a necessary evil. Nothing is free and the government doesn't have a dime to its name. They get their money from us, the taxpayers.

Governments create their own underground economies as i saw a while back in New York City. The industry was the cigarette industry.

In New York City a pack of cigarettes runs upwards of $14, figure about $120 or so a carton. That's if you go to a regular store.

One of the guys I work with gave me the inside scoop on this and how it works on the streets. You go to a certain convenience store and explain that you are a friend of Al. The storekeeper then reaches into a cabinet and fishes out a carton of one's favorite smoke and hands it to you and you hand him $90. He puts the $90 in his pocket.

If you don't know Al and ask for a box he charges you the $120 and it goes into the register. I asked the guy that took me there what tax stamp is on the smokes and he said it was most likely Delaware.

The scam is simple. You drive to Delaware and buy a case or three from a smokeshop there and pay full Delaware price. Delaware gets their tax money.  

You then stuff it in your trunk and drive back to NYC and drag it into your shop and sell them. The deal was on the up and up until you crossed the state line.

Delaware smokes for top brands run about $60 a carton so every carton the shopkeeper sells puts $30 untaxed dollars in his pocket. It adds up fast.

Of course, New York City never sees a dime of that money. For that matter, neither do the Feds.

The smoker and shopkeeper win and NYC loses out. Incidentally a lot of cops will turn a blind eye to this, especially if they are a smoker. Cops don't like taxes, either.

In short, NYC has created their own little crime wave.

This doesn't include the hijacking of cigarette trucks by mob guys, either. A stolen carton of smokes is 100% profit. When you do the math, the mob types can sell a stolen carton for $5 and still make a killing. At 60 or 70 bucks a box the money they can make is insane. 

I suppose the city will appoint a task force and a couple of shopkeepers will get pinched but they are pretty unlikely to end the black market on smokes any time soon because there is just too much money in it.

Like I said earlier, governments create their own crime waves.

I suppose you could also say they create business opportunities, too. But not the kind they bargain for.




To find out why the blog is pink just cut and paste this: http://piccoloshash.blogspot.com/2009/12/my-feminine-side-blog-stays-pink.html NO ANIMALS WERE HARMED IN THE WRITING OF TODAY'S ESSAY