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Show SEMILUXUHY TAX IS TRYING 10 RETAILER Will Necessitate Most Elaborate Elab-orate System of Bookkeeping, Book-keeping, Merchants Say. Theaters Are Expected to Be Hit Hard by Additional Addi-tional Levy. t3ookkf;tp-ra nr not re now rifl Nor the rewards their kibor brings. There has usually been :i supply of men of figures larger than the demand for the fa;ime. Kut, if the opinion formed by some rialt I,ake iTiercliantH as to the working of the new st-miluxury taxes is correct, this same man who adds the columns of the I-dL-r is ffoing- to be the most needed member of mercantile toeit.ty. The scmiluxury taxes are to bo collected col-lected by the retailer, and upon him falls The burden of ru-eoutitirk' for his collections collec-tions to the federal Kovermnent. Such is the variety of taxable articles, and Ihe vaiietv of tax amounts placed on these, that it will take a lot of bookkeepers book-keepers to keep a business firm more than a lump ahead of the government, according to business men interviewed yesterday. Collection Costly. V. Adams, vice president and treasurer of Gardner & Adams company, com-pany, characterized the revenue measure meas-ure as "the most trying tax for the retailer re-tailer that has ever been imposed." He went further and firmly expressed the conviction that the act would have been repealed bv the last congress had it not been for the last minute filibuster, and asserted his belief tUrtt it will bo invali- j datfrl by the next session. "Mr. Adiims, with oiher merchants, said; that he believes it will cost almost as; much to collect the semlluxury tax as j the ifovernment will realize from it. Ad- ; clitfonal book-keepers will be necessary' to abstract daily or weekly tho totals of the luxury tax collected. Most retail es- ; labhshments carry both taxable articles, and nontaxable articles. In order to make proper accounting to the government i t will be necessary to enter the amount of smiluxury tax on each Individual sales slip that carries a. taxable item. Then the bookkeepers will have to separate the amounts and charge them to the proper accounts. Consumer Pays. Some of the smaller business houses do ljot use the individual sales slips, but .if they wish to meet the requirements by reporting and paying the tax it will be almost imperathe for them to install some such svsk m. Tho question was presented as to huw far the government will be able to check accounts rendered by firms with inadequate books. H. N. Byrne, managing director of Keith-O'Brien company, said that his concern will have littles difficulty in keeping keep-ing track of the taxes, but commiserated the usual fate of the consumer, on whom the burden will fall. Keith-O'Brien merchandise mer-chandise that is taxable will be lagged with the usual ccst price with the , s;mi-luxury s;mi-luxury tax iv.dioated separate'y. Of course, in this event the consumer has one satisfaction sat-isfaction mostly denied him. Tie will hrmw how much of the pair of shoes he I u's in shoes, and bow much tax. But he wiil have to pay both just the same. Trouble for Theaters. It is not only the merchants who see 1 troubles ahead with the application of the new tax, hut the amusement men as j well. Take the cuse of the moving pic- j turo houses, where an additional 5 per cent on their monthly film rentals will ! be turned ever the federal treasury, i Jeorge E. Carpenter, manager of the j .1 'aramount-Empress theater, said yester- day that in this instance it would prob- ; ably be the theaters whijeh would have the j burden of the additional tax. rather than the public. The public is already paying! 1 he 10 per cent admission war tax, and the theaters will have to meet as best they can the additional levy. Mr. Carpenter Car-penter expn.rsed Die opinion tha t many of the rmailer picture houses in the country coun-try districts will be compelled to discontinue discon-tinue business, while the other t heaters, now conducted at a small margin of profit, will find it. hard to make both ends meet. Admission prices, he said, are now about all that the pulV.ic will stand for, and, therefore, the managers will have to find their tax money in other pockets than those of their patrons. Theaters, too, he said, will have to enter the market mar-ket for bookkeepers, for as the taxes grow the need for adequate and accurate business busi-ness records grows, and the bookkeeper will enter into an era of unprecedented prosperity. The bookkeeper is truly this time the one to whom the allegWl ill wind 1 (lows good. |
