St. Pauli Girl Beer and Beck's Beers are brands that are owned by InBev. InBev is a Belgian beer conglomerate and is rival to Heineken ,a Dutch conglomerate. Heineken is the majority shareholder in Commonwealth Brewery. They funded and had a close relationship with Burns House. Burns House purchased and absorbed several liquor wholesalers. After doing that, they became the exclusive distributor of Heineken products. Those products included Kalik, Heineken, Guniness and Vita Malt. They stopped the importation and sale of InBev products in their stores

This is what happens when you have monopolies. Monopolies reduce consumers choices, stifle innovation and sometimes keep prices artificial high. Burns House was the leading liquor wholesaler in the Bahamas. They also operate a large number of liquor stores. Heineken through Commonwealth Brewery purchased them and rebranded them as 700 Wines and Spirits. If the Bahamas was a sensible progressive country, the country would have passed anti- trust laws. The Americans did that over a hundred years ago when Theodore Roosevelt was president.

Marlon Johnson speaks with a forked tongue .He was right there when the FNM government zero -rated those bread basket food stuffs. Now he is saying that is the wrong tax policy. Some body with a real PHD said to me, he did not know what he was doing. The person said to me, he is just a cell phone salesman. All the programs he cancelled at the Ministry of Finance, he had to restart.H e never answered the questions that were posed to him about the 2018 budget.Those questions were posed by a former senior FNM cabinet minister who served as Minister of Finance.

Male academic underachievement is not discussed or researched much in the Bahamas. Caribbean academics like the late Rex Nettleford and Dr,Errol Miller have written about it. A white Bahamian said this, Sociology is not studied in the Bahamas like in the rest of the english speaking Caribbean.The late Edward Seaga, a prime minister of Jamaica was a trained sociologist

@This is Ours. You simply do not understand much. The officials at the Ministry of Finance do not live in a bubble like you. I personally do not care much about the Financial Secretary.Some body told me several years ago what was happening and will happen. The Bahamas is on a slippery slope to bankruptcy and the IMF is pressuring this country to deal with it's deficits. The country can not borrow as it use too. So this government like the previous government has to increase tax collection. It is simply by what method. I do not support this rate of tax increase. But i know what they are desperately trying to do.

The two main pillars of this economy have a high level of foreign ownership and control. So a lot of the profits earned here are remitted to the home country of the owners. Also the main segment of tourism, cruise ,there is a low amount of expenditure by visitors in this country. Cruise visitors only spend around $ 84.00 compared to $2,700 for stop-over visitors. Most bahamians do not understand what that disparity means.

There is no high level of local inputs in the tourism industry compared to other caribbean countries. The level of linkages to the rest of the economy to the tourism economy is low. Some one told me on a visit to Barbados,all of the furniture in the hotel room they stayed in was made by a local factory in Barbados.

There is no real attempt to export Bahamian made products to the Bahamian diaspora outside the Bahamas. Compare this to Jamaica. I have seen quite a bit of Jamaican made products in south Florida. Busta sodas, Red Stripe Beer,and HTB Bakery products.

The Bahamas is a hard country to live and work in for some people.High levels of corruption,nepotism, victimization and crime is a turn off for some Bahamians. The utilities and infrastructure here is horrible. A lot of talented Bahamians have left this country and taken their skills and energy elsewhere A relative of mine told me what her son said to her. He told her he saw no economic future in this country for him

The Bahamas has the same problem like so many countries. Based on how the economy is structured, it benefits certain groupings. There is growing, widespread social and economic inequalities in this country. That is being increased by poor government policies and poor choices by individual Bahamians.

Most journalists in the Bahamas aspire to be public relations professionals.That is where the money is. So they are not going to ruffle feathers.The media here is very pliable to economic pressures.

Journalism in the Bahamas was behind it's regional counterparts in the big four English speaking caribbean countries.That was the opinion of a late senior politician.He regularly subscribe to and read their newspapers .He did that to follow up on developments in those country.

The VAT was put in place in 1973 when Edward Heath was prime minister. The same year the Bahamas became independent and the UK joined the European Economic Community. Mrs.Thatcher was a cabinet minister then and not prime minister then.Labour and and as well as the Liberal Democrats have made no attempt to repeal it

The island of New Providence needed a proper public transportation system from the nineteen fifties. A German company proposed one for the island in the nineteen seventies.That was rejected by the PLP government at the time.They did not want to offend the taxi cab union. Hence now you have chaos on the roads on this island.

Tiny Bermuda has a first class bus system, A cousin who visited Bermuda told me that.A former co-worker who lived and worked in Bermuda for some time. The former co-worker said Bermuda is way more advanced than the Bahamas in so many ways.

The implementation of this measure needs to be pushed back by one year at least.It will give the businesses and accounting firms time to prepare for it. There is an acute shortage of accountants who do audits in this country. A former managing partner of a major firm here in the Bahamas said there was a constant turnover of staff in his firm. Bahamians are unaware of that. Audit is hard work. Some firms here in the Bahamas employ expats to assist in audits.

@This is Ours. The Minister of Finance is well aware of this law. This requirement was an amendment to the business licence act during the budget debate. He read and presented it in parliament. An accountant who watched the BICA presentation explained that to me.He told me what the Financial Secretary said.

1. The previous budget performance was reviewed by the analysts in the Ministry of Finance.
2. Meeting were held with the finance policy team and the budget team.
3. A policy paper was prepared and given to the Minister of Finance.
4. Brave Davis took that paper to cabinet and they supported these changes.The Attorney General office drafted these laws.

What is happening now is what Hubert Ingraham basically prophesied ten years or more ago.These changes are now being dictated by the IMF and the Bahamas international creditors.The Bahamas can no longer easily borrow money on the international market. There is a saying it een going,it coming.

The sentiments expressed in the article are true and spot on. A former coworker said this. I lived and worked in Bermuda in the early 2000's.Bermuda is way more advanced than the Bahamas in many ways.