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  3. Imagine a Briton’s new year resolutions: he vows to stop smoking 20 cigarettes a day, and abandon his daily bottle of claret and

Imagine a Briton’s new year resolutions: he vows to stop smoking 20 cigarettes a day, and abandon his daily bottle of claret and

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问题     Imagine a Briton’s new year resolutions: he vows to stop smoking 20 cigarettes a day, and abandon his daily bottle of claret and nightly whisky. Confronting his enlarging gut, he may even promise to make his ten-mile round-trip commute by bike, not car.
    What admirable goals. And since this gentleman’s annual vice bill comes to around 7,500 pounds, he will be well-rewarded for his virtue even before considering the effect on his health. But the Treasury might rejoice a little less. In the fiscal year 2010-11 nearly 10% of all taxes collected came from duty on alcohol, tobacco, and fuel as well as from vehicle excise duty, a tax that falls most heavily on the least efficient cars. You may say that New Year resolutions are notoriously short-lived, but the longer-run trend still looks bad for the exchequer. Because many vices are in constant decline, so are receipts, predicts the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR).
    Smoking rates have been falling for decades, attributed partly to high taxes, and partly to public health campaigns changing social mores and a smoking ban in workplaces introduced across Britain in 2007. The government could respond by increasing sin tax rates. But when duties rise, so do the incentives to get around them, by buying abroad or on the black market. This is particularly common with cigarettes, which are easy for individual smokers to import. In 2000 non-duty consumption reached a peak of 78% , a consequence of the weak euro as well as a sudden increase in taxes of inflation plus 5%.
    Petrol taxes are leaking more quickly. As with smoking, behavior is changing; car and van mileage has fallen for four consecutive years, partly because petrol is so expensive and new vehicles have better engines. These trends, as well as the rise of electric and hybrid cars, are forecast to compress receipts from 1.8% of GDP in 2010 to just 1.1% in 2030.
    There are, of course, advantages to Britons giving up their filthy habits. Smoking is the leading cause of preventable illness and premature death in Britain. It cost the National Health Service more than 5 billion pounds a year in 2005-06, some 5.5% of its budget at the time, according to an Oxford University study. But any benefit to the NHS may be short-lived. Those who do not perish from diseases associated with smoking are likely to die more slowly of age-related illnesses.
    In moral terms, a decline in sin tax receipts suggests a job well done. But in fiscal terms, a hole is a hole. As the OBR sees it, falling Treasury income means Britons will be getting, in effect, an unannounced tax cut. Other taxes could therefore rise without leaving people worse off in aggregate. The maths makes sense. For the virtuous, though, being clobbered with new taxes may seem a rather poor reward.
It can be inferred from the passage that the sin tax is______.
选项 A、a tax levied to curb unhealthy consumption
B、the most important source of revenue of British government
C、a tax levied on the basis of personal income
D、a tax borne by enterprises rather than consumers
答案A
解析 本题考查对文章中反复出现却没有给出明确概念解释的关键词“sin tax”的理解。根据对文章内容的理解，“sin tax”指的就是政府针对烟酒、汽车等征收的税收。之所以把这些税收称之为“sin tax”，是因为吸烟、喝酒、驾车等属于不良的生活习惯，税收作为一种经济调节手段能够抑制人们对于这类产品的消费。因此判断，[A]选项能够符合文中描述“sin tax”的税种特点。[B]选项错误，虽然说“sin tax”是英国财政收入的重要来源，但是根据第二段的内容我们知道，它在税收收入中的比重只占到10％，还不是最重要的税收来源。[C]选项错误，通读全文，不难推测，“sin tax”是一种基于消费行为所征收的税种，和基于个人收入征收的个人所得税有本质区别。[D]选项错误，“sin tax”最终的承担者是消费者，否则就不会出现税收增高消费减少的情况了。
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