Wine Taxation without Tourism Representation

Breaking Travel News | Rebuilding Travel | Livestream | Trends | eTurboNews

Meet Ben Aneff, president US Wine Trade Alliance,

interviewed by Dr. Elinor Garely, eTurboNews New York, and wines.travel

Taxes on products we love and want are never popular. When it comes to increasing wine prices because of a tax, we are likely to become livid. Perhaps the imported wine industry became a tariff target during the last administration because the fellow who resided in the White House preferred Coke over sparkling wine or Riesling; had his beverage choice been different the taxes may have fallen on the water or soft drink industry instead.

Trade Dispute

The Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR) imposed a 25 percent tariff on most wines imported from France, Germany, Spain and the UK starting in October 2019, in retaliation for a long-running aircraft subsidy dispute between the US and the European Union involving Boeing (Chicago) and Airbus (Leiden, Netherlands). Raising tariffs by 25 percent is estimated to increase US prices of wine grapes by an average of 2.6 percent, and producer prices of bottled still wines by 1.1. percent in the targeted countries. The tariff is currently operational.

The United States is the largest importer of French wines and the Trump-led US government had proposed an additional tariff of 100 percent on French Champagne and other sparkling wines. President Trump was a big fan of tariffs although economists view this form of taxation as a burden on importers that is passed down to consumers in the form of higher prices at the cash register. Fortunately for French wine fans, this tariff was not implemented; however, the 25 percent tariff already on European wines may be increased and currently being discussed in Washington.

--- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/etn/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/etn/support