The effects of the Alcopops tax (Family Planning in Gungahlin)

fnaah said :

p1, I thought it was funny. And there’s a fair bit of truth in the argument.

Aussiegal, your threats of damnation don’t really scare people who don’t believe in hell, but feel free to cast me down with Beelzebub and all his little wizards while you’re at it. If hell exists, we’ll be down there fornicating and gambling and drinking and playing loud music and blaspheming for all eternity while you try not to think about the fun you should have had on earth while you had a chance.

you seem to think that hell is warm?

canberra must be hell in summer.

or hell in winter.

always thought that hell is other people….

jakez said :

peterh said :

jakez said :

peterh said :

want to stop underage drinking? up the legal age to 21. then the mates who are 18 can’t buy for their younger mates. and by the time they are 21, they can face tougher penalties for providing to minors.

I don’t think that has really worked in the USA.

yeah, but at 21, most kids don’t give a rats about their younger mates.

Not true at all. The supply of delicious illegal alcohol would flow steady and strong into the mouths of our younger citizens.

I have seen the kids receive alcohol from people of the tender age of 40, and have also seen the police deal with this particular supply extremely definitively. (used to work at woolies in belco mall, on a checkout and in liquor)

my parents raised me with an appreciation of alcohol, and i choose not to drink. my mates and i used to drink, but I guess i grew out of the need. I would prefer to do the same with smokes, but it hasn’t happened yet.

education in the family home has to be enforced by considerate parents, otherwise the education will lead to other behaviours that parents don’t want to encourage – binge drinking is mostly about testing your limits. and i did, over the years.

p1, I thought it was funny. And there’s a fair bit of truth in the argument.

Aussiegal, your threats of damnation don’t really scare people who don’t believe in hell, but feel free to cast me down with Beelzebub and all his little wizards while you’re at it. If hell exists, we’ll be down there fornicating and gambling and drinking and playing loud music and blaspheming for all eternity while you try not to think about the fun you should have had on earth while you had a chance.

I heard that France doesn’t have nearly as much of a youth alcohol problem as we and other countries do. I don’t have the details unfortunately.

That is what I have heard also, however broad scale cultural change isn’t something you just “implement” during a term in governmment.

p1 said :

Want to see underage drinking go down? Totally change the culture of drinking in the country, and increase the education of children within the family structure.

I heard that France doesn’t have nearly as much of a youth alcohol problem as we and other countries do. I don’t have the details unfortunately.

It would be interesting to examine what happens in places such as France (where children drink wine with their parents at dinner), and Ireland (where I don’t think there is a drinking age, or if their is it is quite low).

peterh said :

jakez said :

peterh said :

want to stop underage drinking? up the legal age to 21. then the mates who are 18 can’t buy for their younger mates. and by the time they are 21, they can face tougher penalties for providing to minors.

I don’t think that has really worked in the USA.

yeah, but at 21, most kids don’t give a rats about their younger mates.

Not true at all. The supply of delicious illegal alcohol would flow steady and strong into the mouths of our younger citizens.

Want to see underage drinking go down? Totally change the culture of drinking in the country, and increase the education of children within the family structure.

mmm, sounds simple, doesn’t it.

oh, and at AussieGal83

That comment may not have been very funny, but it was intended as a joke. I assume that your belief in Jebus is so secure that you need to defend any slander against his minions on earth venemantly?

jakez said :

peterh said :

want to stop underage drinking? up the legal age to 21. then the mates who are 18 can’t buy for their younger mates. and by the time they are 21, they can face tougher penalties for providing to minors.

I don’t think that has really worked in the USA.

yeah, but at 21, most kids don’t give a rats about their younger mates.

peterh said :

want to stop underage drinking? up the legal age to 21. then the mates who are 18 can’t buy for their younger mates. and by the time they are 21, they can face tougher penalties for providing to minors.

I don’t think that has really worked in the USA.

I was under the impression that alchohol sales had not gone down and that harder drinks had increased proportionally to the decrease in alcopops.

However, if anyone has an independent source to prove otherwise i’ll be happy to agree.

I was looking at the info for retail sales the other day, as my super is interlinked with the retail trade.

Spirit sales have increased, alco-pops are down, no mention about complementary sales of frangers.

the problem is that the retail stats are based on select areas of the nation. Aboriginal communities are excluded from the figures, as are less influential suburbs.

want to stop underage drinking? up the legal age to 21. then the mates who are 18 can’t buy for their younger mates. and by the time they are 21, they can face tougher penalties for providing to minors.

Haha, frangers next to booze. That’s gold!

jr: with respect to what you said to josh;

has the total amount of spirits sold gone up or down since the tax was introduced? Let me answer that one; it has gone down; its almost as if the tax was working. Hmmmm. Oh and what did the expert on teen drinking invited to address the fed. Lib caucas ( the session they invited the media to) have to say about the tax? I’ll give you a hint; he was a fan.

Its simple economics that when a price rises some demand shifts to substitutes and some demand disapears, just because some demand shifts to substitutes doesn’t mean the tax hasn’t reduced total demand. The fact you’ve failed to grasp this while uncritically swallowing the alcohol industry opinion says a lot. Considered a job with news limited?

Oh and no matter how pompously you reply when people refute your arguments; you’re still wrong.

@josh

josh said :

…want to avoid the “penalty”? then stop drinking. or, to quote a horde, “put up or shut up”.

(a) The excise should be equitably applied on a volumetric basis (i.e. based on the amount of alcohol involved). The way legislation is currently structured it it little more than a revenue raising exercise and simply encourages individuals to save a considerable amount by purchasing bulk spirits and mixers. In my mind the conscientious drinker is being penalized for adopting a responsible (measured) approach to alcohol consumption.

(b) For you information I am personally unaffected by the “alcopops tax” as for the most I don’t drink, and on the rare occasions when I do drink it is never an “alcopop”.

(c) So how many times have you been prepared to put your hand up and stand for public elected office? I’ve done it twice so far.

That’s a bit much. You might disapprove of beer, but P1 has a right to drink it without going to hell.

p1, go to hell. And rot there.

Actually, I am drinking beer. But I am waiting for the Alcopop tax to fail to make it all the way through parliament, so that the government can refund me all the taxes that I have paid over the last few months……

p1 can clearly been mixing his own. I hope he/she has condoms.

tp

> Yet the Federal government chooses to penalize these drinkers

oh for f***’s sake. if you’re going to make a ridiculous statement, at least spell it right. in any case, it’s not penalising anyone.. you’ll note people still have the choice, and can avoid this “penalty” by simply not purchasing the product.

want to avoid the “penalty”? then stop drinking. or, to quote a horde, “put up or shut up”.

…unprotected sex… = Catholics

…greatest threat to mankind… = Evil

QED

The Pope = Satan

A leading World Health Organization academic on birth control, reproductive health and population issues, John Gillebaud, recently told a conference that ‘unwanted teenage pregnancies following bouts of binge drinking are contributing to the world’s unsustainable population growth’ and that ‘unprotected sex leading to unwanted pregnancies is the greatest threat to mankind’.