Photo: RNZ
Happy birthday, GST. You probably pay it every day - 70c or so on a bottle of milk, $150 on an airfare.
But did you know the tax, which is applied to almost everything you buy, has turned 40?
This December marks 40 years since the law changed to allow Goods and Services Tax (GST) to be introduced in New Zealand. It took effect the following October.
Alan Bullot, a GST expert at Deloitte, said there was a lot to celebrate about the tax.
"New Zealand certainly wasn't a trailblazer, but the GST legislation we brought in in New Zealand is seen universally as almost being best practice from a tax design point of view.
"It has a broad base that has very few exceptions and it just gets on with the business of what the tax is supposed to do, which is collect some money for the government to go off and do what the government needs to."
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He said when GST was first introduced in New Zealand, about 30 or 40 countries had a similar tax.
"Now, it's the vast majority of countries other than America that have a national GST or VAT regime.
"Governments just love GST or VATs because they can forecast its collection a lot bette
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