ผู้วิจัย/Authors: Bandit Sornpaisarn

ชื่อเรื่อง/Title: Taxation measure for alcohol consumption control and new drinker prevention.

แหล่งที่มา/Source: The 3rd National Alcohol Conference "Alcohol : No Ordinary Commodity", 21st-22nd November 2007, Richmond Hotel, Nonthaburi, Page 122.

รายละเอียด / Details:

Taxation is the important measure of alcohol consumption control via price mechanism Taxation helps increasing price that causes alcohol consumption decline, especially among adolescence and the poor, which affects consumption consequences such as accidents finally. There are several alcohol taxations including general and specific methods. The general alcohol taxations are custom duty, value-added tax. The specific alcohol taxation is the excise tax. In Thailand it has two more tax on alcohol product that are tax for community which is 10% of excise tax and tax for health which is 2% of excise tax. Thus the excise tax is the important measure to control alcohol consumption directly because it can be manipulated up and down for alcohol consumption control purpose directly and it affects community and health tax further. The value-added tax is not used for control alcohol consumption directly because it affects other goods also. There are 3 main kinds of alcohol excise tax methods that are (1) Specific rate, this method is health protection measure because higher alcohol content product will be taxed more, causing less consumption meaning better health (2) Ad Valorem rate, this method is extravagance protection measure because the higher alcohol product price will be taxed more, causing less consumption meaning less money used, and (3) Combination rate, this method combines both Specific and Ad Valorem rates, which can be calculated both methods but collected only one method that generated more revenue, as Thailand present method, or collected both methods together. Specific rate methods is health protection, better than the Ad Valorem rate method, but does not prevent new drinker consumption. In comparison between specific rate method and Ad Valorem rate method, the specific is better in health protection perspective because the Specific rate method will more tax on alcohol content directly, affecting decreasing alcohol consumption, while the Ad Valorem rate does not. The adolescent new drinkers usually started drinking with alcoholic beverages that were looked good, stylish, tasty or low alcohol concentration, such as males prefer beer and female prefer alcohol mixed with fruit juices. These kinds of alcoholic beverages usually have low alcohol content which their production processes have packaging and transportation and labor cost as high as high alcohol content products. In addition, these kinds of products attracted teenagers have more costs on advertisement. Therefore the unit cost per liter of pure alcohol in the bottle of low alcohol concentration is higher than in the bottle of high concentration. The Ad Valorem rate method cause more tax than specific rate methods in the case of low alcohol content beverages, causing higher prices meaning less adolescent consumption and new drinker prevention. Thus even the specific rate method seems to be better in overall alcohol consumption control but it cannot prevent new drinkers because it causes low alcohol content beverages less tax, less retail prices. It seems that the specific rate methods is better on protecting health via overall alcohol consumption reduction by increasing tax on alcohol content directly while the Ad Valorem rate methods is better on preventing new drinkers via making teenager preferred beverages more tax more price. Therefore it has a challenge question that is there any tax method being able to decrease overall consumption and prevent new drinkers simultaneously?. The Combination methods. Two-Chosen-One method and Combined method, are the methods can decrease overall alcohol consumption and prevent new drinkers. The "Two-Chosen-One method", the alcohol taxation in Thailand at present time, The system of calculating excise tax based on "Two-Chosen-One" and The-Combination-of-the-Two" are the best methods of reducing general consumption as well as preventing new drinkers. The system of calculating excise tax based on "Two-Chosen-One" (as abbreviated) is the system of excise tax system in Thailand at the moment under the Alcohol Act B.E.2493. This method is based on calculating taxes based mixing the two methods including the volume of alcohol content and according to value of selling price but the collection is on the only method that yields higher revenues to the state. In this Two-Chosen-One system. All alcohol beverages must be subject to the basic tax system according to the specific rate first but the expensive products (such as alcohol beverages with low concentration of alcohol but high price because of high costs of production or those imported from overseas with high cost of transportation) when calculated based on the ad valorem rate the value is higher than the tax base on the specific rate, the differences must be paid. Therefore, the Two-Chosen-One system is able to protect consumers' health in general as well as prevent new drinkers. In terms of protecting consumers' health, all alcohol products must be subject to be taxed according to the specific rate, which is comparable to the advantages to the system of calculating excise tax based on the specific rate. The prevention of new drinkers is through the system can be calculating tax based on the ad valorem rate (Remark: This Two-Chosen-One system can be compared with the system of calculating tax base on the specific rate that is used by many countries on the grounds that consumers' health must be protected. Thus this Two-Chosen-One system may be called under a different name as the "Specific Plus" system because the lowest basic tax is equal to the system of calculation based on the specific rate added with the additional taxes from the calculation based on the ad valorem rate or the "plus" factor. This is one of the system that protects the consumers' health as well as prevents new drinkers. No doubt, this system is much better than the specific rate only method.) ‹dd.The "Combination-of-the-Tw0-system" is based on the calculation and collection on taxes of the two systems that are both on the specific rate and the ad valorem rate. (Remark: the specific rate is based on one calculation and one collection (1st collection), the ad valorem rate is based on another method of one calculation and one collection (2ne collection). But the method of Two-Chosen-One is equal to two calculations but one collection. The Combination-of-the-Two method is equal to two calculations and two collections). Therefore, the latter system allows every alcohol beverages to be subject to be taxed according to the specific rate, which protects the consumers' health in general and the ad valorem rate, which prevents new drinkers. The advantage of this system is that it is not as complicated because the method of calculation is straight-forwarded and easily understandable compared to Two-Chosen-One method. Recommendations for improving the excise tax system in Thailand The excise tax system of Thailand must not be changed to the specific rate because it will lower the tax of alcohol beverages with low concentration favored by teenagers (such as beer, alcohol beverages with mixed fruit juices) and imported alcohol (teenagers enjoy but cannot afford to buy because of the prices) making them affordable. This will encourage more new drinkers. The excise tax system Two-Chosen-One method in Thailand can be further developed into the Combination-of-the-Two method. The advantages are that it is not complicated, protective of consumers' health and preventive of new consumers. At the same time, it is straight-forward and easily understandable. However, the rate of each method must be appropriately calculated.

Keywords: alcohol, alcohol consumption control , new drinker prevention, tax, taxation

ปีที่เผยแพร่/Year: 2007

Address: Center for Alcohol Studies.

Code: 200800175

ISSN/ISBN: 978-974-09-4574-1

Country of publication: Thailand

Language: English

Category: Abstract

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