Reforming Taxes on Wine and Other Alcoholic Beverage Consumption

As part of a comprehensive review of Australia's tax system, the taxes on alcoholic beverages recently came under scrutiny. In its initial response to the review in May 2010, the government chose to not change those taxes, even though the review recommended the wine tax switch from an ad valorem to a volumetric basis and that all beverages be taxed to the same extent per litre of alcohol. This paper introduces a mini-symposium of three other papers aimed at contributing to what will be an on-going public policy debate on the optimal taxation of alcohol for purposes of covering social costs associated with harmful alcohol consumption, influencing consumer behaviour through altering beverage prices levels and relativities, and raising government revenue.