Wednesday, 9 December 2009

Beer tax in WW II

Why did the price of Bitter rise 20% (from 10d to 12d) between 1940 and 1942? For once, a question with a simple answer.

Take a look at the table below:


The tax on an average pint of beer rose just a shade under 2d between 1940 and 1942.

That's your answer: tax.
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6 comments:

Atis said...

Why did it keep rising after the war? Just to see how far up it could go without impacting demand?

9 December 2009 at 05:01
Ron Pattinson said...

Atis, because Britain was nearly bankrupt at the end of WW II. Things didn't start picking up until the 1950's.

You can see something similar, but shorter-lived, at the end of WW I. The worst shortages, highest taxes and lowest-gravity beer were after the end of hostilities.

9 December 2009 at 05:32
Bill said...

I hate the so called sin taxes. A pox on all politicians who think it is easy to tax that which is pleasurable to some. A bankrupt country should be refinanced equally by it's population. Maybe next time we should have a holy water tax, communion tax or bible tax.

9 December 2009 at 14:53
mentaldental said...

"Britain was nearly bankrupt at the end of WW II"

Britain was nearly bankrupt in 1940. If I remember correctly the country was just a couple of weeks from running out of cash. Without Lend-Lease we would have gone under. God bless FDR!

And I think we finally paid off the debt last year, didn't we? That's OK though--Gordon's found us a new one!

9 December 2009 at 15:08
Atis said...

Thank you, I forgot that post-war period was quite difficult as well.

It was slightly different here, the Soviet Union raised the capital by nationalising everything :)). With regards to beer, it become way more accessible because of significantly smaller taxes (it is thought that Latvia had the highest beer tax in Europe during the 20s and 30s).

10 December 2009 at 01:09
Anonymous said...

If I'm asked this on the Life in the UK Test...I'm ready!

Sorry I missed you at Giant Beery London Day! Hopefully next year.

11 December 2009 at 02:38

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