FLETCHER DOBYNS

The charge was made that the wealthy, who paid the larger proportion of an income tax, could get the poor and the middle class to pay the taxes via a Federal Alcohol Tax which would be paid proportional to the alcohol consumed—not even the cost of the alcohol. A quart of cheap whiskey was taxed at the exact same amount as a quart of fine, aged, double malt liquor—about the most regressive tax that has been and still is in force in America. If Prohibition were still in force, the Federal Government would have to raise the income tax to make up for the loss of an alcohol tax. It is debated to this day, how much of a factor this played in the repeal of prohibition.

The charge was made that the wealthy, who paid the larger proportion of an income tax, could get the poor and the middle class to pay the taxes via a Federal Alcohol Tax which would be paid proportional to the alcohol consumed—not even the cost of the alcohol. A quart of cheap whiskey was taxed at the exact same amount as a quart of fine, aged, double malt liquor—about the most regressive tax that has been and still is in force in America. If Prohibition were still in force, the Federal Government would have to raise the income tax to make up for the loss of an alcohol tax. It is debated to this day, how much of a factor this played in the repeal of prohibition.