Rising prices
Sir: I am often surprised at the complaints of high, and constantly rising, prices in the shops. Many articles whilst in the above category, would be very much more expensive were it not for the advent of supermarkets, the aboli- tion of retail price maintenance, and quantity buying. A good example is whisky, which at somewhere between 5s. I Id. and 7s. 6d. a bottle, is considerably cheaper than most of our grand- fathers could have bought it. The same ap- plies, though perhaps not so markedly, to petrol and tobacco where they are cut-price.
If you should wonder where I can buy spirits for 5s. 11d., why then, almost anywhere, for the rest of the cost, 44s., is, of course, duty, and nothing to do with the price. Retailers and manufacturers have been constantly passing on their own profits to the customer in order to present a reasonable figure, but it would be more sensible, would it not, for goods to be advertised for sale, as they are in America and elsewhere, without the tax payable, so that the public could remark, and justly protest at the incredible, when digested, purchase tax and duty we pay on many goods.
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