Sales Taxes3

A sales tax is a general tax levied on consumer purchases of nearly all products. It is added to the final price paid by the consumer.

For the most part, sales taxes are collected by individual merchants at the time of the sale and are turned over weekly or monthly to the proper government agency. Most states allow merchants to keep a small portion of what they collect to compensate for their time and book-keeping costs.

The sales tax generally is a very effective means of getting revenue for states and cities.

Property Taxes4

A major source of revenue is the property tax — a tax on real property and tangible or intangible personal property. Real property includes land, buildings and anything else permanently attached to them. Tangible property⁵ is all tangible items of wealth not permanently attached to land or buildings, such as furniture, automobiles, the stock of goods in retail stores and clothing. Intangible personal property⁶ includes stocks, bonds, mortgages, and bank accounts.

The main problem with personal property as a source of revenue is that many items are not always brought to the attention of the tax assessor — the person who places value on property for tax purposes. Because of this, many things that should be taxed never are. Another problem is that some property is very hard to evaluate fairly.

Comments

1. percentage rate of taxation — процентна ставка оподаткування

2. no matter what their income — незалежно від прибутку

3. sales taxes — податок з продажу

4. property taxes — податок на власність

5. tangible property — матеріальні активи

6. intangible property — нематеріальні активи

Vocabulary exercises

I. Name the word-building elements (suffixes, prefixes) and the part

of speech of each word. Translate the words:

tax — taxater — taxable — taxability — taxation — taxer — taxing — taxman; impose — imposing — imposition; permanence — permanency — permanent — permanently; collect — collected — collection — collective — collectively — collectivise — collectivism — collector — collectivity.

II. Find equivalents:

1. proportional tax 2. progressive tax 3. regressive tax 4. percentage rate of taxation 5. sales tax 6. to impose/levy a tax 7. to collect taxes 8. property taxes 9. real property/estate 10. to pay taxes 11. source of revenue 12. bank account 13. tangible property 14. essentials

а. регресивний податок б. процентна ставка оподаткування в. податок з продажу г. пропорційний податок д. стягувати податки е. податок на власність є. прогресивний податок ж. нерухоме майно з. предмет першої необхідності и. обкладати податком і. банківський рахунок ї. джерело доходу й. матеріальні активи к. платити податки

III. Match the antonyms:

income, expenditure, low income, to spend, to go up, to decrease, fairly, to save, high income, to prohibit, wholesale, tangible, permanently, indirect tax, to change, non-essentials, to be the same, to allow, intangible, direct tax, retail, unjustly, temporarily, essentials.