The Salt Industry Commission was an organization created in 758, during the decline of Tang dynasty China, used to raise tax revenue from the state monopoly of the salt trade, or salt gabelle. The commission sold salt to private merchants at a price that included a low but cumulatively substantial tax, which was passed on by the merchants at the point of sale. This basic mechanism of an indirect tax collected by private merchants supervised by government officials endured to the mid-20th century. The salt tax enabled a weak government to sustain itself; the government need control only the few regions that produced salt.[1] Plans to end the government monopoly on salt by 2016 were announced in 2014.[2]
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