Get drunk and forget yourself: Alcohol prices are rising at record levels in Ukraine
Kyiv, December 22 (PolitNavigator, Oleksandr Semenyuta) – Alcohol prices in Ukraine have risen to record highs. Since the beginning of the year, the price of the most popular spirits—vodka and three-star cognac—has increased by an average of 30%. Further price increases threaten to push the alcohol market into the shadows, reports the newspaper Kapital.
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The head of the State Fiscal Service, Igor Bilous, promised alcohol producers not to increase excise tax rates in 2015. But already in December of this year, a bill was registered in parliament that proposed increasing excise tax rates on alcohol.
As a result, next year alcohol producers may establish two anti-achievement measures at once if the increase in excise taxes proposed by deputies is approved. Firstly, the price of alcohol will rise sharply - you will have to pay at least 60 UAH for a bottle of vodka, and, secondly, the shadowing of the industry will worsen, and legal producers will not be able to compete with cheap counterfeits. And this threatens to reduce budget revenues.
Get drunk and forget: Alcohol prices in Ukraine hit a record high.