Prepare Yourself For 16% Tax Added Onto Food And Medicine

In no way did I claim to be an expert about anything. I searched and found stuff and posted what I found without comment of any kind. That was the info I found. I do not claim to know anything.

This appears to be completely false and misleading according to reports to which you provided links.

It wasn't so FALSE AND MISLEADING on the supermarket cash register tags, and Farmacias Similares receipts sitting 18" from my laptop. Lettuce, eggs, meat, and tomatoes were taxed. Metoprolol, and verapamil medications for the heart were taxed.

So much for that. ADUANA (Also known as Hacienda, SHCP, SAT) blew it. They sent out official notification and businesses started adding the tax. The public went ballistic. The tax was rescinded without a damned word from Hacienda.

But I have the register receipts and the printing is crystal clear.

In a nutshell, now at this moment there is no tax on groceries or medicines. Purchases yesterday verified this.

I am damned sensitive to penalizing the poor. The government may want to continue to institute restrictions so fly-in tourists are emphasized to come, stay a week, blow ten grand then get the hell out, but it's the overland tourist that helps spread meager but important money where Cantcun, Puerto Vallarta and Cabo San Loco tourist dollars never reach.

As a voter, my opinion is that if the PRI pushes the food and medicine tax, the red, white and green circle with the letters PRI will become as extinct as the dodo.

Using 12.8 to 1 USA Dollar to peso exchange rate MAGNA, meaning regular now costs 3.56 DOLLARS PER GALLON.

But when I wrote the OP, the tax was in force and being collected. Mexico is like that. A month or two before the PASSPORTS ONLY law went into effect, Tijuana, Tecate and Mexicali immigration demanded passports, no birth certificates allowed. When I posted that online, the doubters sprang to their feet. I guess the joke is on them.

It's too easy for armchair pundits located thousands of miles from the Mexican border to become "online experts". It's different when you encounter reality face-to-face.

I am not a WSJ subscriber nor did I join - I Googled Mexico 16% Sales Tax and looked at just a few of the results to find the info.

Thanks briansue.

The PRI got their way, and IVA the 16% National Sales Tax has been added to FOOD and MEDICINE. I have already noticed some price increases in other industries (mostly tourist oriented).

This appears to be completely false and misleading according to reports to which you provided links.

As you highlighted, the tax is does not apply to food and medicine.
The tax only applies to the border states which had a more favorable tax.
The rest of the country already had a 16% sales tax.

Border state residents would go across the border to shop in the US.
So the border states were given a special tax break to help compete and keep Mexican residents shopping on the Mexico border side.


BTW; your link to the WSJ article doesn't work unless you are a subscriber - so all we get is a popup to join.

Tried to research this a bit - wanted to know what this tax is about and where the money would go - education? - health? don't know? But here is some more for those interesting in reading and trying to learn.

FROM:

http://www.banderasnews.com/1310/nr-mexicobordercitioessalestaxhike.htm

AND:

http://www.kpbs.org/news/2013/sep/24/mexico-proposes-border-sales-tax-hike/

AND:

http://www.economonitor.com/blog/2013/02/mexicos-tax-reform-in-the-works-preview-and-initial-considerations/


Sales Tax in Mexico's Border Region Could Rise to 16%
Jill Replogle - KPBS.org
go to original
October 1, 2013

Mexico City, Mexico - If Mexico's national congress passes a proposed tax reform package, border residents could start paying a lot more for goods and services. Or, they could start doing a lot more shopping in the US.

Under the reform proposed by Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, sales tax in Mexico's northern and southern border regions would rise from 11 percent currently to 16 percent.

The rest of Mexico already pays a 16 percent sales tax, but the border region has paid a reduced sales tax since 1980. That's because it's assumed that residents of Mexico's border region will choose to shop across the border - in the US on the northern border - if goods are significantly cheaper there. Border cities like San Diego, El Paso, and Tucson, all have sales tax rates around 8 percent.

The proposed reform would not affect food or medicine.

Still, Mexican border businesses and economists worry that the reform will have serious negative impacts on the economy of cities like Tijuana. Noé Arón Fuentes, an economist at the Colegio de la Frontera Norte in Tijuana, recently wrote a paper predicting the reform would cause a 2.2 to 2.6 percent decline in the GDP of Baja California.

Fuentes also predicts that the tax hike burden would fall disproportionately on the shoulders of poor border residents, since they are less likely to have the means and, most importantly, the visa to shop in the United States.

The proposal to unify Mexico's sales tax is part of a larger effort to reduce the country's dependence on revenues from the state-owned oil company, Pemex, and to increase the federal government's tax income in order to pay for a national pension system and unemployment insurance.

However, opponents of the border region tax hike say the Mexican government could actually collect fewer taxes if border consumers are forced to spend less, or if they opt to shop in the US.

"The federal government is trying to identify more sources of income, and probably did not really stop and reflect about the impacts that it could have," said Flavio Olivieri, CEO of the Tijuana Economic Development Corp, which promotes business growth in the region.

Olivieri and other Mexican business leaders are lobbying their congressional representatives to get the tax hike removed from the final bill.

Of course, the tax reform could be good news for US businesses in the border region. The San Diego-Tijuana consulting firm, Crossborder Group, estimates that Mexican residents spend a minimum of $3.5 billion annually on shopping trips to San Diego.

BUT OF COURSE:

October 9, 2013, 5:54 p.m. ET
Mexico's Congress Set to Dilute Tax Plan

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303382004579125863948318336.html

A sixteen percent food/medicine tax will hit common folks very hard.
Imagine living in a place like this:

This section of neighborhood has since been torn down to make way for new condos. I don't know where the residents went.
It was located in Zamora, Mx next to the condos my father-in-law lived in.
My father-in-law was both a hard-nosed redneck of the Mexican variety and a cheap sob.

When he needed a heart stent he shopped around and found a doc who would do it for cash. Total cost: $3000.
Result: Excellent - he lived many years and would have lived longer if he continued taking his meds for prostate cancer.
The meds worked very well and he felt better.
So of course he felt "cured".
You can guess the rest.

Lots of provincial pov opinions here.
The following is not opinion. . .

The Joint Commission sets the gold standard of care for US hospitals.
Those of you associated with the health care industry know about the Joint Commission.

The Joint Commission International is the same organization but is dedicated to the accreditation of foreign hospitals.
International travelers can find a Joint accredited hospital at http://www.jointcommissioninternational.org/JCI-Accredited-Organizations/

Patients Beyond Borders is another helpful site - I would term it a "soft" site compared to a "hard" site such as the Joint site.
Safe travels everyone.

moisheh wrote:
Chris would have you think that the IMSS is the mayo clinic. He also criticizes gringo who try to help poor Mexicans.

Moisheh

Anything else you would like to add to your *&^&*^ comment Moisheh?

Medicinas patentes USED to be inexpensive in Mexico. Using the immortal words of Inspector Clouseau

Not

Any

More

Let's see, generic Terzosina 5mg, 30 tablets, EIGHT HUNDRED PESOS. That's seventy dollars. But then I have to pay Hacienda TEN DOLLARS IN TAX. Now go to Wal-Mart and see where NINETY DOSES of this medicine costs TEN DOLLARS with NO tax.

Junk food crazed Mexicanos are to blame for much of the diabetic damage Moishe. A syringe in one hand, fried pig fat and coca cola in the other. The indigena culture cannot tolerate a western diet, at all. A tremendous percentage of Mexicans are lactose intolerant as well. Classic indigenous diet frailties. The doctors yell "Don't eat this! Don't eat that!" and the folks ignore them. Incredible sensitivity to the perception that "they are not adequate" and are excluded from the rewards of "The Good Life".

If somehow Lake Texcoco could exact revenge and swallow Mexico City maybe just maybe a one in a million chance could happen - for Mexico to embrace manufacturing items for health care, not the machines, no one can beat Chinese subsidies, but the test strips could be made here. The governor just gave the community a new Ford ambulance with De-fibrillator but the Chofer could just as soon flap his arms and fly as he could wield that machine. Fito is afraid of it.

IMSS, and ISSSTE doctors have to do their residency at a Periferico which means clinic.

And if you should EVER need strong analgesic opioid medication for pain, you is S O O L in Mexico. The strongest pain medication available with or without an Rx is a weak codeine tylenol three dollar a pill excuse. By the name of Tylex. Snap an arm? Snap your neck? Get a dislocated shoulder? Hahahahahahahahaha better get used to pain amigo or go see the guy with the AK47 for some Mexican black tar to suck on. Only five hundred dollar a day private hospitals dispense thirty dollar per injection opioids.

Chris would have you think that the IMSS is the mayo clinic. He also criticizes gringo who try to help poor Mexicans. Are any of you diabetic? Test strips and the machines are moy caro in Mexico. Most diabetics can only get their blood tested once a week. How often do diabetics NOPB test their sugar? Daily I think. In our community an American retired nurse donates machines and strips and has started a "club" where diabetics can come and have their blood tested. If the IMSS was so great every diabetic would have a machine and strips at no charge. The poor certainly cannot afford that stuff. BTW: Diabetes in Mexico is rampant. Probably 50% higher than in the USA. Where are the health nurses that should be providing care and most of all education for the poor so they don't become diabetic? To be fair Mexico does sometimes try and do the right thing but more$$ are needed. Some of the IMSS hospitals specialize in one field of medicine. As long as a patient can afford to travel and has someone in that area to assist they can get better care. Usually the very poor and the elderly just suffer. One thing that has not been mentioned are the small IMSS clinics in outlying communities. These are staffed by Drs. that have recently graduated. They are young, intelligent and very savvy when it comes to modern medicine. These Drs. have to serve for about a year before they can enter private practice. A great idea.

Moisheh