As the relevant market failure costs of excessive alcohol consumption refer to domestic residents, a corrective tax base would be a consumption or destination base rather than a production or origin base. With the exception of duty-free allowances for international travellers, the consumption base principle is applied with the current excise tax and wine equalisation tax. As at least a half of alcohol purchased by international travellers is by Australian travellers, under a consumption base, there is a strong case to remove the existing exemption of taxes on alcohol sold to international travellers.