Mineral water tax

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Bottles with seltzer closures in a historic beer crate

The mineral water tax is a historical consumption tax with which not only mineral water , but also lemonades and beer-like drinks were taxed in Germany. This law was preceded by the ordinance on beer and beer-like drinks of January 24, 1918, according to which breweries were only allowed to produce beers with a maximum of 3% original wort .

Germany

The first Mineral Water Tax Act was passed by the Reichstag on July 26, 1918 and came into force on September 3, 1918. This tax was doubled on May 1, 1922 and repealed by a law of August 11, 1923 with effect from September 1, 1923 because it did not cover the collection costs due to hyperinflationary inflation. But even after that, mineral water was taxed as part of the beverage tax in individual particularly polluted communities . The first mineral water tax law led to a reduction in the number of mineral water factories, fountains and medicinal springs from 11,389 in 1918 to only 3,639 in 1925; At the same time, the national output of sweet beverages fell from over 3.857 million hectoliters in 1919/20 to less than one million hectoliters in 1922/23.

The second Mineral Water Tax Act was passed by the Reichstag on April 15, 1930 . Most of the income was intended to benefit the municipalities, which had been heavily burdened by the considerable increase in expenditure on unemployed welfare since the winter of 1929, and were intended to improve the equalization of elementary school costs. At the suggestion of the Reich Minister of Finance , the tax was suspended by cabinet order for the period from January 1, 1932 to December 31, 1933. By then, it had only brought in 12 million instead of the 40 million Reichsmark that had been hoped for. On November 15, 1933, the Mineral Water Tax Act was repealed by a Nazi regulation .

The regulations regarding beer-like beverages were taken over from the Brewery Tax Act of 1909 in 1918 ; Together with the Mineral Water Tax Act, the first beer tax law for Germany was passed on July 26, 1918 , which now prohibited the designation of drinks with less than 3% original wort as beer. With the repeal of the mineral water tax laws , the taxation of beer-like beverages was taken over again in the updated beer tax law. This included water filled into beer bottles as well as unfermented drinks made from malt extract ( malt beer ) and beer lemonades. The right to interpret what was to be taxed as a beer-like drink in each case lay with the Reichs and then with the Federal Ministry of Finance until the new version of the Beer Tax Act 1993, in which beer-like drinks were deleted from the law .

Austria

In Austria a tax on mineral water was introduced on February 6, 1919; from 1922 it was 10% on the sales price.

As early as July 28, 1917, the Austro-Hungarian Ministry of Finance, together with the Ministries of the Interior, Trade and the Office for People's Nutrition, issued an ordinance on the production of beer substitutes , in which beverages were defined and taxed , "those made from water and Hops (hop extract) or a bitter substances that replace hops as well as from other additives are prepared with the addition of carbonic acid and are similar to beer in appearance and taste, but not beer (wort) ".

See also

literature

  • Otto Grote, Walter Bernhard: Commentary on the Beer Tax Act: Completely revised in continuation of the Koppeschen beer tax commentary. VLB Berlin 1953
  • Koppe / Fleminger: Beer tax law: Reich and municipal beer tax. 4th edition, Industrieverlag Spaeth & Linde: Berlin 1931
  • Rudolf Sajovic: The wine tax, sparkling wine tax and mineral water tax: Laws and ordinances with explanatory notes, a list of sources and detailed subject registers along with the wine law and other relevant regulations. Manz: 1934

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Daily newspaper for breweries from January 30, 1918
  2. ^ Carsten Weerth: Mineral water tax . In: Gabler Wirtschaftslexikon , accessed on July 27, 2018
  3. ↑ Hans Jürgen Teuteberg: From 'healthy wells' in spas to modern mineral water production . In: Rolf Walter (ed.): History of consumption . Franz Steiner Verlag 2004, p. 123 ff. 148. Google Books
  4. ↑ Surén: The last changes of the municipal financial law and the ways out of the financial need of the municipalities. In: Verwaltungsakademie Berlin (ed.): New ways of local government. Berlin and Leipzig 1932, pp. 68 ff., 73. Google Books
  5. ^ Ministerial meeting of December 4, 1931, mineral water tax files of the Reich Chancellery / documents. Website of the Federal Archives , accessed on July 27, 2018
  6. ^ Wolfgang Fritz: Progress and barbarism. Austria's financial administration in the Third Reich. Lit Verlag 2011, p. 256. Zugl .: Linz, Univ.-Diss., 2010. Google Books
  7. ↑ https://austria-forum.org/af/Community/Alles_%C3%BCber_%C3%96sterreich/Regelung%20Bier Ersatz