How much would be lost from vat reform?

Dannyboy83

If Irish Vat were reformed from 21.5 to 15%, what would be the loss to the exchequer?

Just looking at the figures of money lost to the North in shopping alone, would it not make more sense to lower the vat rate so that it wouldn't be worth peoples while going North?
Maybe even draw some customers here?

I just saw there was a massive haul of cigarettes captured in Louth, representing a loss of €40 million to the exchequer. Its laughable that police and customs are wasting their time on cigarettes when they are far more important things they should be doing.
The fact that some gang even bothered to import 180million cigarettes into this backwater just shows how out of kilter our system is with the rest of the world. In most countries you make you're money importing illegal drugs.
In Ireland, you can make it importing legal drugs.

I was on a British forum recently and Londoners were complaining about the cost of Dublin and saying they were cancelling their trips to Dublin in future. Over £8 for a box of cigarettes compared to £6 in the UK.

ParkRunner

It's ironic that the more people go up north to shop for their goods, the more we will all have to pay to reduce the exchequer deficit through higher taxes and more unemployment from expenditure cuts and less money flowing around the economy.

The UK are planning to raise their Vat rate in the coming months so hopefully Lenihan will cut our Vat rate in December to stop the huge loss to the exchequer! It will probably be cost neutral at worst as people spend more money in this economy..he has has very little to lose

thebman

He already admitted it was a mistake so he should do the sensible thing.

I think given we will be at British pound/euro parity sometime within the next year most likely, we should match the VAT rates to stop cross border shopping.