Drink more beer! The government needs the money
Putting money over morals, dozens of states and cities across the U.S. have tinkered with laws that regulate alcohol sales as a way to build up their budgets. With cities across the country facing their fifth straight year of declining revenues, raising money from people who enjoy a cocktail is becoming an increasingly attractive option.
U.S. media report that 12 states have raised taxes on alcohol or changed alcohol laws to increase revenue, including Maryland, which in July pushed the sales tax on alcohol to 9 percent, from 6 percent – the first such increase in 38 years and one that is expected to bring in USD 85 million a year.
U.S. states and local governments take in USD 17 billion a year from alcohol taxes. And although the number has been rising steadily, the recession has slowed that growth.
Still, states keep adding them. The state of Illinois, a major beer drinking state, raised alcohol taxes in 2009 specifically for roads, schools and other projects, adding about USD 100 million a year to the capital fund. In 2010, Washington State installed a temporary excise tax on certain beers that adds about 28 cents a six-pack. In three years, it should bring in about USD 180 million.
Surprisingly, even legislators down south in the bible-belt state of Georgia have seen the light – or rather the allure of dollar bills. Voters in November will decide whether to repeal colonial-era laws that ban alcohol sales on Sunday.
Georgia is one of only three states left (Connecticut and Indiana are the others) that prohibit selling any kind of alcohol on Sunday. Although people can buy a drink at a restaurant in some communities, stores cannot sell it.
The roots of the ban are religious and the law was defended for years by Governor Sonny Perdue, who had vowed to veto any legislation that tried to change it. However, when Governor Nathan Deal took office this year, lawmakers overrode opposition by religious groups and some rural legislators and wrote a law allowing local governments to put the question of Sunday sales to a vote.
On 8 November 2011 nearly 100 Georgia cities and counties will hold referenda on the issue.
In the neighbouring state of Tennessee, changes to the alcohol laws were intended as economic stimulus, but of a different sort. In an effort to attract a large out-of-state brewer (Sierra Nevada from California – BRAUWELT International reported), the state now allows high-alcohol beers like stouts and barley wines to be produced under certain circumstances.
The new law also made it legal for Tennessee’s six microbreweries and stores that sell alcohol to offer samples. Tennessee is the eighth state to pass legislation allowing liquor tastings since 2009.
