Value added tax

That crappy 20% extra sales tax you pay if you eat your Pret sandwich at a grubby table in the shop rather than taking it away in a smart but environmentally-devastating paper bag.

VAT also applies to certain financial transactions (power and gas trading, for good example), legal bills and so on. Known in some of the colonies (Canada, New Zild) as GST (that’s goods and services tax or — ho ho ho — Ge Stapo tax), and in the new world generally as just “sales tax”, but it's the same idea. A tax on buying things. Not progressive, for you social justice warriors, but fairly hard to avoid so popular with Chancellors of the Exchequer.

See also

• Sales Tax under the 2010 GMSLA
• Tax generally — that ghastly inevitability.