Quotes about tax
page 6

“I was informed this afternoon by the distinguished Secretary of the Treasury that his preliminary estimates indicate that our balance of payments deficit has been reduced from $2.8 billion in 1964 to $1.3 billion, or less, in 1965. This achievement has been made possible by the patriotic voluntary cooperation of businessmen and bankers working with your government. We must now work together with increased urgency to wipe out this balance of payments deficit altogether in the next year. And as our economy surges toward new heights we must increase our vigilance against the inflation which raises the cost of living and which lowers the savings of every family in this land. It is essential, to prevent inflation, that we ask both labor and business to exercise price and wage restraint, and I do so again tonight. I believe it desirable, because of increased military expenditures, that you temporarily restore the automobile and certain telephone excise tax reductions made effective only 12 days ago. Without raising taxes—or even increasing the total tax bill paid—we should move to improve our withholding system so that Americans can more realistically pay as they go, speed up the collection of corporate taxes, and make other necessary simplifications of the tax structure at an early date.”

Lyndon B. Johnson (1908–1973) American politician, 36th president of the United States (in office from 1963 to 1969)

1960s, State of the Union Address (1966)

Family, Exercises, Business, Speed

“Björn Wahlroos declared as freedom the most rich persons tax declines and cuts in everything beneficial for the poor. Nokia applies the freedom of Wahlroos. Year 2010 Nokia paied taxes in Finland €1.5 million while three years earlier it paid almost a thousand fold €1.3 billion.”

Satu Hassi (1951) Finnish politician and MEP

Economy
Source: Nallen ja Nokian vapaus Voima 4/2012 page 11 Björn Wahlroos julisti vapaudeksi kaikkein upporikkaimpien veronkevennykset ja leikkaukset kaikkeen siihen, mistä köyhät hyötyvät. Nokia soveltaa Wahlroos vapautta. Vuonna 2010 Nokia maksoi Suomeen veroja 1,5 miljoonaa, kolme vuotta aikaisemmin melkein tuhatkertaisesti 1,3 miljardia. Sillä on väliä, onko yritysverotuksella EU-maissa yhtenäiset säännöt vai ei. Ylikansalliset firmat voivat kikkailla hyödyntämällä eri maiden verotuksen eroja. Kikkailun laillisuutta on vaikea tarkistaa, koska veroviranomaiset eivät julkista tietoja siitä, minne firma veronsa maksaa.

Freedom, Personality

“In an earlier day, the rich lived at the expense of the poor, directly and unequivocally; in a modern economy, unproductive citizens increasingly live at the expense of productive ones—though in an equivocal way, since they are told, and believe, that they are disadvantaged and deserve more still. Today, in fact, a good half of the population of every modern nation is made up of people with little or no income, who are exempt from taxes and live, to a large extent, off the other half of the population, which pays taxes. If such a situation were to be radicalized, it could give rise to massive social conflict. The eminently plausible free-market thesis of exploitation by the unproductive would then have prevailed over the much less promising socialist thesis of the exploitation of labor by capital.”

Peter Sloterdijk (1947) German philosopher

The Grasping Hand (2010)

People, Way

“It does not matter whether the right to govern is hereditary or obtained with the consent of the governed. A State is absolute in the sense which I have in mind when it claims the right to a monopoly of all the force within the community, to make war, to make peace, to conscript life, to tax, to establish and dis-establish property, to define crime, to punish disobedience, to control education, to supervise the family, to regulate personal habits, and to censor opinions. The modern State claims all of these powers, and, in the matter of theory, there is no real difference in the size of the claim between communists, fascists, and democrats.”

Walter Lippmann (1889–1974) American journalist

A Preface to Morals, News Brunswick: NJ, Transaction Publishers (1982) p. 80. First published in 1929.

Life, War, Education, Family

“In our most Puritan of society, gambling-like other pleasures-is either taxed, restricted to certain hours, or forbidden altogether. Yet the impulse to gamble remains an eternal aspect of the irrationality of man. It finds outlets in business, war, politics, in the formal overtures of the gambling casinos, and in the less ceremonious exchanges among individuals of differing opinions.”

Richard Arnold Epstein (1927) American physicist

Preface To The First Edition, p. xiii
The Theory of Gambling and Statistical Logic (Revised Edition) 1977

War, Pleasure, Business

“Poverty is a solved problem - all they have to do is abolish taxes and regulations which cripple those intelligent, capable, and responsible men and women and destroy their productive capacity, then stand back and watch the economy boom.”

L. Neil Smith (1946) American writer

"Merchants of Fear".

Women, Men, Intelligence, Problem

“Recently we heard that a prominent parliamentarian converted government assets to his personal use. Very soon, we will hear of some prominent politicians evading tax deliberately. Very soon we will hear of people abusing their travel entitlements. We extend zero-tolerance to these kind of people and some years ago, we know that the former Prime Minister converted government funds to improve his own personal standing by renovating and upgrading his personal house. The member for Labasa Open went on a fishing trip at government expense … This is fraud. I do not know want you want to call it, but it is fraud, using taxpayers' money for personal use.”

Laisenia Qarase (1941) Prime Minister of Fiji

Parliamentary speech, 23 November 2005 (excerpts)

Money, People, Travel, Fraud

“Why, of all places in Johannesburg, the Indian location should be chosen for dumping down all kaffirs of the town, passes my comprehension. Of course, under my suggestion, the Town Council must withdraw the Kaffirs from the Location. About this mixing of the Kaffirs with the Indians I must confess I feel most strongly. I think it is very unfair to the Indian population, and it is an undue tax on even the proverbial patience of my countrymen.”

Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) pre-eminent leader of Indian nationalism during British-ruled India

Letter to Dr. Porter, Medical Officer of Health for Johannesburg (15 February 1905); later published in The Indian Opinion.
1900s

Feeling, Thinking, Patience

“Taxing is an easy business. Any projector can contrive new impositions, any bungler can add to the old.”

Edmund Burke (1729–1797) Anglo-Irish statesman

Speech on the Independence of Parliament (1780)

Business

“The price-tax conditions necessary to sustain the Pareto optimality of a competitive market solution under the assumed convexity conditions are tantamount to standard Pigovian rules, with neither taxes imposed upon, nor compensation paid to, the victims of externalities.”

William J. Baumol (1922–2017) American economist

Source: The theory of environmental policy, 1988, p. 45; Cited in: Vatn, Arild, and Daniel W. Bromley. "Externalities-a market model failure." Environmental and resource economics 9.2 (1997): 135-151.

Optimism

“Every official was required to undergo, before assuming office… approval before a law court. This was an inquiry into his conduct, his exactness in paying taxes, etc., and it sometimes happened that he was rejected… Every official was also required to take an oath of allegiance.”

James Gow (scholar) (1854–1923) scholar

p, 125
A Companion to School Classics (1888)

Law

“Statism is but socialized dishonesty; it is feathering the nests of some with feathers coercively plucked from others - on the grand scale. There is no moral — only a legal — distinction between petty thievery and political Robin Hoodism, which is to say, there is no moral difference between the act of a pickpocket and the progressive income tax or any other piece of socialization.”

Leonard E. Read (1898–1983) American academic

Anything That's Peaceful https://books.google.com/books?id=4wWA1vexxdsC&pg=PA74&lpg=PA74&dq=%22is+but+socialized+dishonesty;+it+is+feathering+the+nests+of+some+with+feathers+coercively+plucked+from+others+-+on+the+grand+scale.%22&source=bl&ots=1I89gu9Jmo&sig=8jpm9FnYbB87c8BB_twGQw8CC7o&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjIuZ_58vLTAhXD4SYKHbHVAncQ6AEILDAB#v=onepage&q=%22is%20but%20socialized%20dishonesty%3B%20it%20is%20feathering%20the%20nests%20of%20some%20with%20feathers%20coercively%20plucked%20from%20others%20-%20on%20the%20grand%20scale.%22&f=false Anything That's Peaceful (1964)

“Imagine if the government chased sick people with diabetes, put a tax on insulin and drove it into the black market, told doctors they couldn’t treat them, and then caught them, prosecuted them for not paying their taxes, and then sent them to jail. If we did that, everyone would know we were crazy. Yet we do practically the same thing every day in the week to sick people hooked on drugs. The jails are full and the problem is getting worse every day.”

Billie Holiday book Lady Sings the Blues

Source: Lady Sings the Blues (1956), Ch. 17.

People, Imagination, Problem

“There are no checks and balances if the gov is wrong, if a private entrepreneur makes a mistake, he goes bankrupt, the losses are cut, if he bets wrong, he loses, if the gov bets wrong, they just get bigger, they just appropriate more money, it's a bottomless pit, because they either get it from the tax payers or run it off a printing press.”

Peter D. Schiff (1963) American entrepreneur, economist and author

Authors@Google: Peter Schiff (2009)

Money, Loss

“Powers that are constitutionally there can be used but the Scottish Labour Party is not planning to raise income tax and once the power is given it is like any parish council: it's got the right to exercise it.”

Tony Blair (1953) former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

The Scotsman, 4 April 1997.
Asked whether he would intervene to prevent the Scottish Parliament from raising taxes.
1990s

Exercises

“The party of Lincoln and Liberty was transmogrified into the party of hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brownshirts in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, Lamborghini libertarians, people who believe Neil Armstrong's moonwalk was filmed in Roswell, New Mexico, little honkers out to diminish the rest of us, Newt's evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man suspicious of the free flow of information and of secular institutions, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk.”

Garrison Keillor (1942) American radio host and writer

" "We're Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore" In These Times (26 August 2004) http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/979/

People, Faith, Boy, Evil

“The feminist-only funding leads to studies that misinform the nation that a divorced mother is economically more hurt than a divorced man, so judges feel a mandate to make his future income hers, and legislatures feel fine about refusing to make his mother subsidy payments tax deductible even as she pays no taxes on the money received. And all this perpetuates the belief that he earns more money….”

Warren Farrell (1943) author, spokesperson, expert witness, political candidate

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 240.

Money, Feeling, Study, Future

“There are very few men who do not reckon the cost to themselves of a system of taxes before approving it.”

André Maurois (1885–1967) French writer

Un Art de Vivre (The Art of Living) (1939), The Art of Friendship

Men

“II. The tax which each individual is bound to pay ought to be certain, and not arbitrary.”

Adam Smith (1723–1790) Scottish moral philosopher and political economist

Source: (1776), Book V, Chapter II, Part II, p. 892.

“All of our tax-legislation is and remains, so long as we do not have liberation from enslavement to interest, only a tribute-obligation to big capital, and not, as we would imagine, a voluntary sacrifice for the accomplishment of labor for the community.”

Gottfried Feder (1883–1941) German economist and politician

"Manifesto for the Abolition of Enslavement to Interest on Money" (1919)

Imagination, Communication

“I am convinced that the enactment this year of tax reduction and tax reform overshadows all other domestic problems in this Congress. For we cannot for long lead the cause of peace and freedom, if we ever cease to set the pace here at home. For we cannot for long lead the cause of peace and freedom, if we ever cease to set the pace here at home.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

1963, Third State of the Union Address

Peace, Home, Problem, Freedom

“If the Bank really has development at heart, it will change the conditionalities away from privatization, deregulation and lower corporate taxation and put the emphasis on reducing military expenditures, ensuring that progressive tax legislation is enacted and enforced, that tax havens are outlawed, and that a financial transactions tax is adopted and the revenues used to build “A World Free of Poverty” through international solidarity.”

Alfred de Zayas (1947) American United Nations official

Report of the Independent Expert on the adverse impact of World Bank policies on human rights and the realisation of a democratic and equitable international order
2017, Report submitted to the UN Human Rights Council

World, Change, Heart

“IMF's Lagarde has no business in even suggesting that we impose a tax on text. I am against it and will oppose it! Our house is in order. If at all, she should make suggestions to her fellow Europeans who can perhaps learn a thing or two from us. Proud to be Filipino!”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

Francis Escudero Twitter feed: @SayChiz (2:01 p.m. 2012 November 19).
2012, Twitter Feed

Business, Learning, Housing

“I haven't filed a tax return in 30 years.”

Kent Hovind (1953) American young Earth creationist

As quoted by Seth Scheisel, "Your Own Affair, More (VCR) or Less (MP3)", New York Times, (Oct 2, 2003)

“I wish that I wasn't seen differently. I wish that people looked at me and just saw that I was a good person with a good heart. And that wants to make people laugh. And that's who I am. I also happen to be gay. And I would love to have the same rights as everybody else. I would love, I don't care if it's called marriage. I don't care if it's called, you know, domestic partnership. I don't care what it's called. I mean, there are couples that have been together, 30 years, 40 years. And all of a sudden, they lose their house, you know, the taxes kill them, because it's different because they're not married. Everything is taken away just because. You know, with Sept. 11, there are a lot of people that lost their partner and didn't get the same benefits. It's not fair. And at the same time I know there are people watching right now saying, you know, it's sick it's wrong, it's this. And it's like, I can't convince them that I'm not sick or wrong, that there's nothing wrong with me. You know, I can live my life and hope that things change, and hope that we're protected as any other couples”

Ellen DeGeneres (1958) American stand-up comedian, television host, and actress

Ellen Degeneres talking about being gay with Stone Phillips in an interview for Dateline NBC, Nov. 8, 2004

Love, Life, Marriage, People

“The world is changing and we are awakening. These statistics give us a numerical glimpse at the visceral dissatisfaction that most of us feel. Now is the time to express it. These corrupt structures cannot be maintained without our compliance. You could vote against them, if there was anything to vote for, but there isn’t, or you could stop paying your mortgage, stop paying your taxes, stop buying stuff you don’t need. When we, the majority, unite and demonstrate our new intention, we will be invincible. If we, who are complicit by our silence, become active and disobedient. This is a pivotal time in the history of our species. We are transitioning from an ideology that places power and responsibility in the hands of the few to one where we all collectively have power. It is important that we clarify, in a manner accessible to all, which institutions and systems are beneficial and which ones have to go. It is important that we propose ideas and systems that will be advantageous, like the handful in this book, and ensure that they are presented properly. When they are inevitably disparaged by the fearful enemies of change, we must remain unified and insistent. At this climactic time, we have no choice but change. This book, written by a twerp, with minimal interaction with brilliant thinkers and uncorrupted minds, demonstrates that. Now, what are you going to do about it?”

Russell Brand book Revolution

Revolution (2014)

Books, World, Fear, Feeling

“Thank you all very much for your hospitality. We've just had a wide-ranging discussions on the matter at hand. Like the good folks standing with me, the American people were appalled and outraged at last Tuesday's attacks. And so were Muslims all across the world. Both Americans and Muslim friends and citizens, tax-paying citizens, and Muslims in nations were just appalled and could not believe what we saw on our T. V. screens. These acts of violence against innocents violate the fundamental tenets of the Islamic faith, and it's important for my fellow Americans to understand that. The English translation is not as eloquent as the original Arabic, but let me quote from the Koran, itself. 'In the long run, evil in the extreme will be the end of those who do evil. For that they rejected the signs of Allah and held them up to ridicule.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2001, Islam is Peace (September 2001)

People, World, Faith, Quotes

“The flat tax I got on my first meeting with Margaret Thatcher, who I admired very much and who was a great admirer of Milton Friedman. I met her first when I had been prime minister I think for some months and so on, and when I told her what I am planning to do, she looked at me with these big eyes and said “you are one brave young man.” And then a little bit introduced me on the realities of the Western world on which I was not very well informed. But I didn’t stop.”

Mart Laar (1960) Estonian politician and historian

Interview with Stephen J. Dubner, for 'Freakonomics Radio' podcast (24 March 2010), when asked how he learned the fate of Friedman's policies in the Western world.

World, Thinking, Reality

“You know, the Democrats want to balance the budget by raising spending and raising taxes. The Soviet Union had a balanced budget.”

Tom DeLay (1947) American Republican politician

Meet the Press, 2003 December 12.
2000s

“It is important to remove artificial barriers–stumbling stones, often local in origin and coming from incumbent opposition to entry–and to not burden businesses with taxes that reduce their internally generated funds for reinvestment, growth and striving to overcome market challenges.”

Vernon L. Smith (1927) American economist

quoted in Nobel Economist Pans Start-Up Chile Concept http://brophyworld.com/nobel-economist-pans-start-up-chile-concept/ (2011).

Business

“No statesman e'er will find it worth his pains
To tax our labours and excise our brains.”

Charles Churchill (satirist) (1731–1764) British poet

Night, an Epistle to Robert Lloyd (1761), line 271

Pain

“In developped countries, successive governments have always acted like firemen putting out fires instead of architects designing new buildings. The tax loopholes they have created are responses to emotions provoked by a given event, or an attempt to ease social tension caused by taxpayer exasperation (and/or reflecting their power). Any rational global management policy must satisfy two imperatives: simplicity; and stability.”

Éric Pichet (1960) economist

General Theory of Social and Tax Expenditures and Proposals for Recasting the French System of Tax 'Loopholes' https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2841200 Article in Revue de Droit Fiscal n36 (2016). Tax policy, Tax and Social Expenditures

Success, Country

“The federal tax system is turning individuals into sharecroppers of their own lives.”

James Bovard (1956) American journalist

From Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty (St. Martin's Press, 1994) http://www.jimbovard.com/Epigrams%20page%20Lost%20Rights.htm

“It would be impossible to reach unanimity on every aspect of our budget, but it's clear there is widespread support for the concept of change. We face a choice between either cutting waste out of government, or facing a new job killing tax increase every year from here on out.”

Mitt Romney (1947) American businessman and politician

Press release, 2003-02-27 http://myclob.pbwiki.com/02-27-2003 2003–2007 Governor of Massachusetts

Support, Change

“In addition to the poll-tax and public degradation in dress and demeanour imposed on them, the non-Muslims were subjected to various hopes and fears. Rewards in the form of money and public employment were offered to apostates from Hinduism. The leaders of Hindu religion and society were systematically repressed, to deprive the sect of spiritual instruction, and their religious gatherings and processions were forbidden in order to prevent the growth of solidity and a sense of communal strength among them. No new temple was allowed to be built nor any old one to be repaired, so that the total disappearance of all places of Hindu worship was to be merely a question of time. But even this delay, this slow operation of Time, was intolerable to many of the more fiery spirits of Islam, who tried to hasten the abolition of ‘infidelity’ by anticipating the destructive hand of Time and forcibly pulling down temples.”

Jadunath Sarkar (1870–1958) Indian historian

Jadunath Sarkar, History of Aurangzib, Volume III, Calcutta, 1928, pp. 164-67. Quoted in S.R.Goel, The Calcutta Quran Petition (1999) ISBN 9788185990583

Money, Fear, Religion, Hope

“What is it—medieval serfs paid about twenty-five percent of their crops to the estate lord, to the manor lord, and Americans are paying fifty percent in taxes by the time you figure out income tax and then all the various state and local taxes, and, to think we're not, y'know, overtaxed is insane.”

Glenn Jacobs (1967) American professional wrestler and actor

18:57&#8211;19:19. "WWE Wrestler Kane Talks Libertarianism, and His Heroes" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpqUIwu8nuc (2013)

Thinking, Time

“Taxes are not good things, but if you want services, somebody's got to pay for them so they're a necessary evil.”

Michael Bloomberg (1942) American businessman and politician, former mayor of New York City

http://www.woopidoo.com/business_quotes/authors/michael-bloomberg-quotes.htm
Taxes

Evil

“I'm opposed to the idea of a flat-rate tax, and I doubt I'd sign it. Attempts to introduce a liberal utopia need to be opposed. The presidential office should oppose such ideas and care for social equilibrium to be maintained.”

Lech Kaczyński (1949–2010) Polish politician, president of Poland

Rzeczpospolita interview (March 2005)

Idea

“The current tax code is harder to understand than Bob Dylan reading Finnegans Wake in a wind tunnel.”

Dennis Miller (1953) American stand-up comedian, television host, and actor

Ranting Again

Understanding, Reading

“Reducing taxes will cause new companies and new jobs to come roaring back into our country.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2016, July, (21 July 2016)

Country

“I'm really calling for major jobs, because the wealthy are going create tremendous jobs. They're going to expand their companies. They're going to do a tremendous job. I'm getting rid of the carried interest provision. And if you really look, it's not a tax -- it's really not a great thing for the wealthy. It's a great thing for the middle class. It's a great thing for companies to expand.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2016, September, First presidential debate (September 26, 2016)

“We justify want of faith by saying, "I don't go to church, but I am better than those who do," as one might say, "I don't pay taxes or serve the nation, but I am better than those who do."”

Fulton J. Sheen (1895–1979) Catholic bishop and television presenter

Source: Peace of Soul (1949), Ch. 6, p. 113

Faith

“We have had landlord rule longer, far longer than the life of the oldest man in this vast assembly, and I would ask you to look at the results of that rule. The landowners have had unlimited sway in Parliament and in the provinces. Abroad the history of our country is the history of war and rapine: at home, of debt, taxes, and rapine too. In all the great contests in which we have been engaged we have found that this ruling class have taken all the honours, while the people have taken all the scars. No sooner was the country freed from the horrible contest which was so long carried on with the Powers of Europe, than this law, by their partial legislation, was enacted—far more hostile to British interests than any combination of foreign powers has ever proved. We find them legislating corruptly: they pray daily that in their legislation they may discard all private ends and partial affections, and after prayers they sit down to make a law for the purpose of extorting from all the consumers of food a higher price than it is worth, that the extra price may find its way into the pockets of the proprietors of land, these proprietors being the very men by whom this infamous law is sustained…”

John Bright (1811–1889) British Radical and Liberal statesman

Speech in Covent Garden (19 December 1845), quoted in G. M. Trevelyan, The Life of John Bright (London: Constable, 1913), p. 142.
1840s

Life, Men, Hostility, War

“Robbing bystanders and living parasitically on tax money is a national, perhaps even genetical special trait of the Somalis.”

Jussi Halla-aho (1971) Finnish Slavic linguist, blogger and a politician

Jussi Halla-aho (2008), published in the blog Scripta Muutama täky Illmanin Mikalle http://www.halla-aho.com/scripta/muutama_taky_illmanin_mikalle.html, June 6, 2008 Halla-aho was condemned for hate speech by Finland’s Supreme Court in June 2012 http://yle.fi/uutiset/supreme_court_orders_halla-aho_to_pay_for_hate_speech/6171739 due to the above two quotes. 2005-09

Money

“New ideas require new facts.
You explain things by way of ideas. Why do we have a government that is run by rich trash? Because they've used their money to buy the presidency. Bush is a tool for the people who don't want an inheritance tax.”

James D. Watson (1928) American molecular biologist, geneticist, and zoologist.

What I've Learned: James Watson (2007)

Money, People, Way, Idea

“Some of these people have come up with some very elaborate arguments [for not paying taxes]. For instance, there were these guys, in Indiana and Nebraska, and they argued that Indiana and Nebraska weren't states, which was a pretty valid argument in the late 1700s. But in 1995 and '96, well, I saw a map and at that time, trust me, Indiana and Nebraska are shitholes, but they're states. I saw them! They were right there in the middle someplace. I may not be able to point them out immediately, but I know they're there.”

Lewis Black (1948) American stand-up comedian, author, playwright, social critic and actor

Taxed Beyond Belief (2002)

People, Guy, Time

“A democratic government is the only one in which those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it.”

Alexis De Tocqueville book Democracy in America

Source: Democracy in America, Volume I (1835), Chapter X-XIV, Chapter XIII.

“Things like the proposed tech tax are actually a very good idea. The specific form of it is debatable, but the idea is that five companies are worth $3.5tn, basically because of network externalities and information monopolies, and therefore are absolutely right for efficient taxation… The marginal cost of production of AI is effectively zero. The ability to make these technologies available to the poorest countries at no cost is an evident option. So we should be taking special care to make sure that this revolution can reach everybody.”

Jeffrey D. Sachs (1954) American economist

Tech tax' necessary to avoid dystopia, says leading economist, the Guardian, 23 Oct 2018 https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/oct/23/exclusive-tech-tax-jeffrey-sachs-ai-wealth-facebook-google-amazon

Idea, Country

“The D. C. career crowd just keeps on doing the same old thing, And you know, the system works pretty well for them – they’re connected. But here in Missouri, we know too many people who can’t get a job. Or if they’ve got a job they can’t get a raise. Farmers are hurting and that means farm kids can’t come home. And as for healthcare and taxes – they just keep going up. Erin and I have decided we have to do something about it. And that’s why next year I’m going to run for the United States Senate. This isn’t something we were planning to do. But we believe we have to do all we can to win a better future for our country. Senator McCaskill – she’s been in D. C. forever. She’s turned her back on farmers. She’s ignored working families. She’s been wrong on every Supreme Court nominee for the last 11 years. She doesn’t represent us. It’s time to do something new. America is an exceptional place, and it’s still a young country. Its future is worth fighting for. So let’s get ready and do our part.”

Josh Hawley (1979) United States Senator from Missouri

Here in Missouri https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6E1AWV3zXCk (October 9, 2017)

People, Family, Home, Time

“Let him make this challenge: "I'll release my tax returns when Barack Obama releases his college transcripts and the copy of his admission records to show whether he got any loans as a foreign student. When he releases that, talk to me about my tax returns."”

Mike Huckabee (1955) Arkansas politician

2012-01-20
The O'Reilly Factor
Fox News
TV, quoted in * 2012-01-20
Matt Gertz
Huckabee Wants To Know If Obama Got College Loans "As A Foreign Student"
Media Matters for America
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201201200016
2011-05-27
regarding criticism of presidential candidate Mitt Romney for refusing to release his tax returns

“Despite loud complaints from members of the financial elite about high tax levels, it's interesting to note that they still manage to live in the finest houses, eat at the best restaurants, shop at the most expensive stores. If this is coercion, we should all experience it.”

Linda McQuaig (1951) journalist and author

All You Can Eat: Greed, Lust and the New Capitalism (2001)

Housing

“I am not a great fan of shouting down people or being rude to people, I think we have a situation and a Congress that's way out of touch with where the American people are. People have a right to be angry when Congress gives tax breaks to billionaires and wants to cut nutrition programs for low income pregnant women. You have a right to be angry. Take that out in a constructive way. … I think people have a right to go into a restaurant and have dinner, that's where we got to place our energy. I do know that people are angry. They are angry about these terribly inhumane immigration policies. They're angry about the fact they can't afford prescription drugs. They are angry about tax breaks that go to billionaires. The way to deal with that is exactly what Alexandria did. Organize at the grass roots level. Win elections and get involved in the political process.”

Bernie Sanders (1941) American politician, senator for Vermont

About the Red Hen restaurant controversy. Video online https://www.mediaite.com/tv/bernie-sanders-defends-sarah-sanders-people-have-a-right-to-go-to-a-restaurant-for-dinner/ at Mediaite, 27 June 2018. 2010s, 2018

Women, People, Way, Thinking

“All the Hellenistic States had thus been completely subjected to the protectorate of Rome, and the whole empire of Alexander the Great had fallen to the Roman commonwealth just as if the city had inherited it from his heirs. From all sides kings and ambassadors flocked to Rome to congratulate her; they showed that fawning is never more abject than when kings are in the antechamber…w:Polybius dates from the battle of Pydna the full establishment of the universal empire of Rome. It was in fact the last battle in which a civilized state confronted Rome in the field on a footing of equality with her as a great power; all subsequent struggles were rebellions or wars with peoples beyond the pale of the Romano-Greek civilization -- with barbarians, as they were called. The whole civilized world thenceforth recognized in the Roman senate the supreme tribunal, whose commissions decided in the last resort between kings and nations; and to acquire its language and manners foreign princes and youths of quality resided in Rome. A clear and earnest attempt to get rid of this dominion was in reality made only once -- by the great Mithradates of Pontus. The battle of pydna, moreover, marks the last occasion on which the senate still adhered to the state-maxim that that they should, if possible, hold no possessions and maintain no garrisons beyond the Italian seas, but should keep the numerous states dependent on them in order by a mere political supremacy. The aim aim of their policy was that these states should neither decline into utter weakness and anarchy, as had nevertheless happened in Greece nor emerge out of their half-free position into complete independence, as Macedonia had attempted to do without success. No state was to be allowed to utterly perish, but no one was to be permitted to stand on its own resources… Indications of a change of system, and of an increasing disinclination on the part of Rome to tolerate by its side intermediate states even in such independence as was possible for them, were clearly given in the destruction of the Macedonian monarchy after the battle of Pydna, the more and more frequent and more unavoidable the intervention in the internal affairs of the petty Greek states through their misgovernment, and their political and social anarchy, the disarming of Macedonia, where the Northern forntier at any rate urgently required a defence different from that of mere posts; and, lastly, the introduction of the payment of land-tax to Rome from Macedonia and Illyria, were so many symptoms of the approaching conversion of the client states into subjects of Rome.”

Theodor Mommsen (1817–1903) German classical scholar, historian, jurist, journalist, politician, archaeologist and writer

The Changing of the Relationship between Rome and Her Client-States
The History Of Rome, Volume 2. Chapter 10. "The Third Macedonian War" Translated by W.P.Dickson
The History of Rome - Volume 2

War, People, Youth, World

“I’m tired of being told that I have to pay more taxes to “keep people in their homes.” Sure, if they lost their jobs or got sick, I’m willing to help. But if they bought McMansions at three times the price of our paid-off, $250,000 condo, on one-third of my salary, then let the leftwing Congresscritters who passed Fannie and Freddie and the that created the bubble help them—with their own money.”

Robert A. Hall (1946) American politician

I'm Tired (February 19, 2009)

Money, People, Home, Time

“While a guy at home is sweating over his income tax and Victory garden, a dogface somewhere is getting great joy out of wiggling his little finger. He does it just to see it move and to prove to himself that he is still alive and able to move it.”

Bill Mauldin (1921–2003) American editorial cartoonist

Up Front (1945)

Guy, Home, Victory, Joy

“The idea of abolishing Income Tax is to me highly attractive, both on other grounds & because it tends to public economy.”

William Ewart Gladstone (1809–1898) British Liberal politician and prime minister of the United Kingdom

Letter to H. C. E. Childers (3 April 1873)
1870s

Idea

“We're also going to have to change our trade, immigration and economic policies to make our economy strong again. And to put Americans first again. This will ensure that our own workers, right here in America, get the jobs and higher pay that will grow our tax revenues, increase our economic might as a nation.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2016, April, Foreign Policy Speech (27 April 2016)

Strong, Change

“The tax here involved is bad not because it takes money from the pockets of the appellees. If that were all, a wholly different question would be presented. It is bad because, in the light of its history and of its present setting, it is seen to be a deliberate and calculated device in the guise of a tax to limit the circulation of information to which the public is entitled in virtue of the constitutional guaranties.”

George Sutherland (1862–1942) Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, United States Senator, member of the United States House of Re…

Grosjean v. American Press Co. (1936)

Money, History, Question, Light

“I do not believe that just because you're opposed to abortion, that that makes you pro-life. In fact, I think in many cases, your morality is deeply lacking if all you want is a child born but not a child fed, not a child educated, not a child housed. And why would I think that you don't? Because you don't want any tax money to go there. That's not pro-life. That's pro-birth. We need a much broader conversation on what the morality of pro-life is.”

Joan Chittister (1936) Roman Catholic nun, activist, writer and academic

interview with Bill Moyers, PBS, 2004, http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/archives/chittister_now_flash.html quoted in Catholic nun exposes the hypocrisy of ‘pro-life’ Republicans in one simple quote http://deadstate.org/catholic-nun-exposes-the-hypocrisy-of-pro-life-republicans-in-one-simple-quote/, Deadstate, July 30, 2015.

Life, Money, Education, Birth

“That elections of members to serve as representatives of the people, in assembly, ought to be free; and that all men, having sufficient evidence of permanent common interest with, and attachment to, the community, have the right of suffrage, and cannot be taxed or deprived of their property for public uses, without their own consent, or that of their representatives so elected, nor bound by any law to which they have not, in like manner, assembled, for the public good.”

George Mason (1725–1792) American delegate from Virginia to the U.S. Constitutional Convention

Article 6
Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776)

Men, People, Law, Communication

“We don't know what energy is, any more than we know what information is, but as a now robust scientific concept we can describe it in precise mathematical terms, and as a commodity we can measure, market, regulate and tax it.”

Hans Christian von Baeyer (1938) American physicist

Source: Information, The New Language of Science (2003), Chapter 2, The Spell of Democritus, Why information will transform physics, p. 11

Mathematics

“My work ethic is rigorous, brutal, and uncompromising. I've had my pension plans in place for a long time and I never spend more than I have or forget to pay my tax bills. My repressed, inner Protestant is an absolute Godsend in that respect. I also have lots of highly-paid and well-regarded work outside the comics field now and with Jupiter in the second house on my horoscope, I shouldn't have to worry too much about my dotage. I love the future and it loves me.”

Grant Morrison (1960) writer

2003
http://www.comicon.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=36&t=001597
On himself

Love, Time, Future, Housing

“I think the knowledge about how legislation really affects small businesses is extremely valuable. If you haven’t run a small business, then you don’t have this kind of knowledge about how a regulation passed or taxes increased affects your bottom line. If you recognize that every new regulation takes that much more time to comply with, requires that many more employees, then it really gives you that foundational basis to make those decisions.”

Kristi Noem (1971) South Dakota politician

Miller, Emily. Rep. Kristi Noem: Head of the Class http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=41749, Human Events, February 14, 2011.

Business, Knowledge, Thinking, Decision

“The effect therefore on national wealth of those classes of unproductive consumers which are supported by taxation, must be very various in different countries, and must depend entirely upon the powers of production, and upon the manner in which the taxes are raised in each country.”

Thomas Robert Malthus Principles of Political Economy

Book II, Chapter I, On The Progress of Wealth, Section IX, p. 410
Principles of Political Economy (Second Edition 1836)

Support, Dependency, Country, Wealth

“Good morning. This coming week I will be making the trip up Pennsylvania Avenue to address a joint session of Congress. We have some business to attend to called the budget of the United States. The federal budget is a document about the size of a big city phone book, and about as hard to read from cover to cover. The blueprint I submit this week contains many numbers, but there is one that probably counts more than any other – $5.6 trillion. That is the surplus the federal government expects to collect over the next 10 years; money left over after we have met our obligations to Social Security, Medicare, health care, education, defense and other priorities. The plan I submit will fund our highest national priorities. Education gets the biggest percentage increase of any department in our federal government. We won't just spend more money on schools and education, we will spend it responsibly. We'll give states more freedom to decide what works. And as we give more to our schools we're going to expect more in return by requiring states and local jurisdictions to test every year. How else can we know whether schools are teaching and children are learning? Social Security and Medicare will get every dollar they need to meet their commitments. And every dollar of Social Security and Medicare tax revenue will be reserved for Social Security and Medicare.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2001, Radio Address to the Nation (February 2001)

Money, Children, Health, Books

“There are hundreds of families in the UK who earn over £60,000 in benefits without lifting a finger because they have so many kids (and for the rest of us that’s a wage of over £90,000 before tax!).”

Ben Bradley (politician) (1989) British politician

Ben Bradley under fire for urging jobless to have vasectomies, The Guardian (2018)

Family

“I deny any government, elected or not, the right to kidnap my children and ship them off to a battlefield to kill or be killed. I accept to pay taxes and that's the sum total of my debt to my government. In every other respect, my government owes me, not the other way around.Conscription is the most fundamental denial of liberty, on a par with slavery.I am not a pacifist and I support a professional army. But I oppose the draft even in times of war. If your country cannot find enough volunteers to defend itself when attacked, then it's not worth defending.”

Bernard Chazelle (1955) French computer scientist

"If You Want a Draft, Draft Yourself!," http://www.tinyrevolution.com/mt/archives/002495.html A Tiny Revolution (2008-08-16)

War, Children, Way, Support

“If the economy of today were operating close to capacity levels with little unemployment, or if a sudden change in our military requirements should cause a scramble for men and resources, then I would oppose tax reductions as irresponsible and inflationary; and I would not hesitate to recommend a tax increase if that were necessary.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

"Address and Question and Answer Period at the Economic Club of New York (549)" (14 December 1962)
1962, Address and Question and Answer Period at the Economic Club of New York (549)

Men, Change

“But you don't have a chance if you can't find a job. I don't think it penetrates the minds of this Administration what it must be like for a factory worker to arrive home to his family with the news that he's been laid off. What it must be like not to know what the future holds for your children, because you don't know what the future holds for you. What it must be like to see the government take hundreds of billions of dollars that could be used to fund job training, unemployment benefits, or jobs programs — and instead to send that money off to people who have such staggering wealth that the new money won't make the tiniest improvement in their lifestyle. What it must be like to be told that tax cuts for the rich are necessary to create jobs for working people, and then to see jobs fall month after month for more than 30 months. If that doesn't break your heart, you don't have a heart.”

Wesley Clark (1944) American general and former Democratic Party presidential candidate

Jobs Plan speech (24 September 2003) http://www.clark04.com/speeches/002/

Money, Children, People, Family

“Corporate inversion, they're leaving the United States, we have almost $5 trillion sitting out there, where they can't get the money back, they can't bring it in because there's no mechanism to bring it back in and the tax is so high. I'm going to bring tremendous amounts of money, tremendous amounts of jobs, tremendous numbers of companies, and yes the tax is going to be cut from the highest tax nation anywhere in the world to a fairly low tax. Not the lowest in the world, but to a fairly low tax.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2016, June

Money, World

“The success with which we have met in all of these undertakings is a matter of universal knowledge. We are at peace with all the world. Those of this generation who passed through the World War have had an experience which will always cause them to realize what an infinite blessing peace is. We are in an era of unbounded prosperity. The financial condition of our National Government is beginning to be more easy to be borne. While many other nations and many localities within our own country are struggling with a burden of increased debts and rising taxes, which makes them seek for new sources from which by further taxation they can secure new revenues, we have made large progress toward paying off our national debt, have greatly reduced our national taxes, and been able to relieve the people by abandoning altogether many sources of national revenue. We are not required to look altogether to the future for our rewards and find in our lot nothing but sacrifices for the present. Now, here, to-day, we are all able to enjoy those benefits which come from universal peace and nation-wide prosperity.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Ways to Peace (1926)

War, People, World, Peace

“It is procedure that governs the routine internal and external relationships - between one individual and another; between one organizational unit and another; between one process and another; between one skill or technique and another; between one function and another; between one place and another; between the organization and the public; and between all combinations and permutations of these. It is by means of procedure that the day-to-day work of government is done-mail sorted, routed and delivered; deeds recorded; accounts audited; cases prosecuted; protests heard; food inspected; budgets reviewed; tax returns verified; data collected; supplies purchased; property assessed; inquiries answered; orders issued; investigations made; and so forth endlessly.”

Dwight Waldo (1913–2000) American political scientist

Source: "Government by Procedure", 1946, p. 381-82; As cited in: Albert Lepawsky (1949), Administration, p. 595

Food

“We shall increase income tax on the better off so that we can help the hundreds of thousands of families now tangled helplessly in the poverty trap by raising the tax threshold and introducing reduced rates of tax for those at the bottom of the ladder. I warn you, there are going to be howls of anguish from the rich. But before you cheer too loudly let me warn you that a lot of you will pay extra taxes too.”

Denis Healey (1917–2015) British Labour Party politician and Life peer

Speech to the Labour Party Conference at Blackpool (1 October 1973).
1970s

Family, Help

“Taxes. Everyone desires a reduction of taxes, and there is a great preponderance of sentiment in favor of taxation reform. When I approved the present tax law, I stated publicly that I did so in spite of certain provisions which I believed unwise and harmful. One of the most glaring of these was the making public of the amounts assessed against different income-tax payers. Although that damage has now been done, I believe its continuation to be detrimental To the public welfare and bound to decrease public revenues, so that it ought to be repealed.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Second State of the Union Address (1924)

Law

“Such a condition will likewise give opportunity to devote our surplus wealth, not to the payment of high taxes, but to the financing of the needs of other nations. Our country has already through private sources recognized the requirements in this direction and has made large advances to foreign governments and foreign enterprises for the purpose of reestablishing their public credit and their private industry.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Ways to Peace (1926)

Country, Wealth

“What's wrong with being naked? I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I pay my taxes. I'm a good man. I'm a good father - try to be, anyway. I try to do the right things in life.”

Howard Stern (1954) American radio personality

Howard Stern, What I've Learned, Esquire Magazine (January 2006)

Life, Thinking

“I like to say I'm more conservative than Goldwater. He just wanted to turn the clock back to when there was no income tax. I want to turn the clock back to when people lived in small villages and took care of each other.”

Pete Seeger (1919–2014) American folk singer

" The Old Left http://www.nytimes.com/1995/01/22/magazine/sunday-january-22-1995-the-old-left.html?n=Top/Reference/Times%20Topics/People/S/Seeger,%20Pete", New York Times Magazine, 22 January 1995, sect. 6 p. 13

People

“When we can build something like the Hubble telescope and fathom images of this vast cosmos of which we are a part, it really gives pause to wonder what and who we are within a larger framework than linear adventures at the shopping mall and taxes.”

Vanna Bonta (1958–2014) Italian-American writer, poet, inventor, actress, voice artist (1958-2014)

Vanna Bonta Talks About Quantum fiction: Author Interview (2007)

Parting

“Arrangements to make people pay for using a program, including licensing of copies, always incur a tremendous cost to society through the cumbersome mechanisms necessary to figure out how much (that is, which programs) a person must pay for. And only a police state can force everyone to obey them. Consider a space station where air must be manufactured at great cost: charging each breather per liter of air may be fair, but wearing the metered gas mask all day and all night is intolerable even if everyone can afford to pay the air bill. And the TV cameras everywhere to see if you ever take the mask off are outrageous. It's better to support the air plant with a head tax and chuck the masks.
Copying all or parts of a program is as natural to a programmer as breathing, and as productive. It ought to be as free.”

Richard Stallman (1953) American software freedom activist, short story writer and computer programmer, founder of the GNU project

1980s, GNU Manifesto (1985)

People, Support, Nature, Parting

“There is one difference between a tax collector and a taxidermist—the taxidermist leaves the hide.”

Mortimer Caplin (1916–2019) Commissioner, Internal Revenue Service; prominent tax attorney; benefactor:University of Virginia

Quoted in Time magazine article Taxes: Enter Balance Due Here http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,829745,00.html, 1 February 1963 http://books.google.com/books?id=YufVAAAAMAAJ&q=%22There+is+one+difference+between+a+tax+collector+and+a+taxidermist+the+taxidermist+leaves+the+hide%22&pg=PA13#v=onepage

“Self-accusation is the possibility of justification. The tax collector accused himself. There was no one else who accused him. It was not civic justice that seized him by the chest and said, “You are a criminal”: it was not the people whom he perhaps cheated who beat him on the breast and said, “You are a cheater” – but he beat his own breast and said, “God be merciful to me, a sinner. He accused himself, that he was a sinner before God.”

Sören Kierkegaard (1813–1855) Danish philosopher and theologian, founder of Existentialism

Three Discourses at Friday Communion November 14, 1849 Hong translation 1997 P. 132
1840s, Three Discourses at the Communion on Fridays (1849)

God, People, Justice, Cheating

“Now, take as an illustration the Rock of Gibraltar. Many of you have been there, I dare say. I have; and among the things that interested me were the monkeys on the top of it, and a good many people at the bottom, who were living on English taxes. Well, the Rock of Gibraltar was taken and retained when we were not at war with Spain, and it was retained contrary to every law of morality and honour.”

John Bright (1811–1889) British Radical and Liberal statesman

Speech in Birmingham (18 December 1862), Speeches on Questions of Public Policy, Volume 1, (London: Macmillan and Co., 1869), p. 214.
1860s

War, People, Law

“Reflect how you are to govern a people who think they ought to be free, and think they are not. Your scheme yields no revenue; it yields nothing but discontent, disorder, disobedience; and such is the state of America, that after wading up to your eyes in blood, you could only end just where you begun; that is, to tax where no revenue is to be found, to — my voice fails me; my inclination indeed carries me no farther — all is confusion beyond it.”

Edmund Burke (1729–1797) Anglo-Irish statesman

First Speech on the Conciliation with America (1774)

People, Thinking

“When I was working a man asked me "Why does a fellow like you, with an education, and who has been all over the country, end up in this out-of-the-way place working for very little on a farm?" I explained that all people who had good jobs in factories, etc. had a withholding tax for war taken from their pay, and that people who worked on farms had no tax taken from their pay. I told him that I refused to pay taxes. He was a returned soldier and said that he did not like war either, but what could a fellow do about it? I replied that we each did what we really wanted to.”

Ammon Hennacy (1893–1970) American Christian radical

The Book of Ammon

War, People, Education, Way

“There is just one thing I can promise you about the outer-space program: Your tax dollar will go farther.”

Wernher von Braun (1912–1977) German, later an American, aerospace engineer and space architect

Attributed in Reader's Digest (1961), and The Yale Book of Quotations (2006) edited by Fred R. Shapiro, p. 101

“Why, sir, there is every probability that you will soon be able to tax it.”

Michael Faraday (1791–1867) English scientist

Faraday's purported reply to William Gladstone, then British Chancellor of the Exchequer (minister of finance), when asked of the practical value of electricity (1850) as quoted in Democracy and Liberty (1899) by William Edward Hartpole Lecky, p. xxxi , and in Discovery Or The Spirit And Service Of Science (1918) by R.A Gregory, p 3. The variant "One day sir, you may tax it." is given in The Harvest of a Quiet Eye : A Selection of Scientific Quotations (1977), p. 56, but they source it to Discovery which differs in its quote. According to Snopes in "Long Ago and Faraday" http://www.snopes.com/quotes/faraday.asp, it is most likely an invented quotation, as there are no contemporaneous records, though Lecky did live through the same time as Faraday and Gladstone. Disputed

“The tongue of the sword of the Khalifa of the time, which is the tongue of the flame of Islam, has imparted light to the entire darkness of Hindustan by the illumination of its guidance… On the other side, so much dust arose from the battered temple of Somnat that even the sea was not able to lay it, and on the right hand and on the left hand the army has conquered from sea to sea, and several capitals of the gods of the Hindus, in which Satanism has prevailed since the time of the Jinns, have been demolished. All these impurities of infidelity have been cleansed by the Sultan's destruction of idol-temples, beginning with his first holy expedition against Deogir,44so that the flames of the light of the law illumine all these unholy countries, and places for the criers to prayer are exalted on high, and prayers are read in mosques. Allah be praised!'…'On Sunday, the 23rd, after holding a council of chief officers, he [Malik Kafur, converted Hindu and commander of the Muslim army] took a select body of cavalry with him and pressed on against Billal Deo, and on the 5th of Shawwal reached the fort of Dhur Sammund after a difficult march of twelve days over the hills and valleys, and through thorny forests. 'The fire-worshipping' Rai, when he learnt that 'his idol-temple was likely to be converted into a mosque,' despatched Kisu Mal' The commander replied that he was sent with the object of converting him to Muhammadanism, or of making him a zimmi, and subject to pay tax, or of slaying him if neither of these terms were assented to. When the Rai received this reply, he said he was ready to give up all he possessed, except his sacred thread.”

Alauddin Khalji (1266–1316) Ruler of the Khalji dynasty

Elliot and Dowson, Vol. III : Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own Historians, 8 Volumes, Allahabad Reprint, 1964. pp. 85-89
Quotes from The History of India as told by its own Historians

God, Law, Light, Time

“With the ablest and most excellent men of his time, of high and of humbler rank, he maintained noble relations of mutual fidelity… As he himself never abandoned any of his partisans… but adhered to his friends--and that not merely from calculation--through good and bad times without wavering, several of these, such as Aulus Hirtius and Gaius Matius, gave, even after his death, noble testimonies of their attachment to him.]]The superintendence of the administration of justice and the administrative control of the communities remained in their hands; but their command was paralyzed by the new supreme command in Rome and its adjutants associated with the governor, and the raising of the taxes was probably even now committed in the provinces substantially to imperial officials, so that the governor was thenceforward surrounded with an auxiliary staff which was absolutely dependent on the Imperator in virtue either of the laws of the military hierarchy or of the still stricter laws of domestic discipline.”

Theodor Mommsen (1817–1903) German classical scholar, historian, jurist, journalist, politician, archaeologist and writer

Vol. 4, pt. 2, translated by W.P.Dickson
The History of Rome - Volume 4: Part 2
Context: The system of administration was thoroughly remodelled. The Sullan proconsuls and propraetors had been in their provinces essentially sovereign and practically subject to no control; those of Caesar were the well-disciplined servants of a stern master, who from the very unity and life-tenure of his power sustained a more natural and more tolerable relation to the subjects than those numerous, annually changing, petty tyrants. The governorships were no doubt still distributed among the annually-retiring two consuls and sixteen praetors, but, as the Imperator directly nominated eight of the latter and the distribution of the provinces among the competitors depended solely on him, they were in reality bestowed by the Imperator. The functions also of the governors were practically restricted. His memory was matchless, and it was easy for him to carry on several occupations simultaneously with equal self-possession. Although a gentleman, a man of genius, and a monarch, he had still a heart. So long as he lived, he cherished the purest veneration for his worthy mother Aurelia... to his daughter Julia he devoted an honourable affection, which was not without reflex influence even on political affairs. With the ablest and most excellent men of his time, of high and of humbler rank, he maintained noble relations of mutual fidelity... As he himself never abandoned any of his partisans... but adhered to his friends--and that not merely from calculation--through good and bad times without wavering, several of these, such as Aulus Hirtius and Gaius Matius, gave, even after his death, noble testimonies of their attachment to him. The superintendence of the administration of justice and the administrative control of the communities remained in their hands; but their command was paralyzed by the new supreme command in Rome and its adjutants associated with the governor, and the raising of the taxes was probably even now committed in the provinces substantially to imperial officials, so that the governor was thenceforward surrounded with an auxiliary staff which was absolutely dependent on the Imperator in virtue either of the laws of the military hierarchy or of the still stricter laws of domestic discipline. While hitherto the proconsul and his quaestor had appeared as if they were members of a gang of robbers despatched to levy contributions, the magistrates of Caesar were present to protect the weak against the strong; and, instead of the previous worse than useless control of the equestrian or senatorian tribunals, they had to answer for themselves at the bar of a just and unyielding monarch. The law as to exactions, the enactments of which Caesar had already in his first consulate made more stringent, was applied by him against the chief commandants in the provinces with an inexorable severity going even beyond its letter; and the tax-officers, if indeed they ventured to indulge in an injustice, atoned for it to their master, as slaves and freedmen according to the cruel domestic law of that time were wont to atone.

Death, Men, Justice, Law

“A basic income paid for out of taxes on the market economy gives people the chance to build positions in the non-market economy. It allows them to volunteer, set up co-ops, edit Wikipedia, learn how to use 3D design software, or just exist. It allows them to space out periods of work; make a late entry or early exit from working life; switch more easily into and out of high-intensity, stressful jobs. Its fiscal cost would be high: that’s why all attempts to enact the measure separately from an overall transition project are likely to fail, despite the growing number of academic papers and global congresses dedicated to it.”

Paul Mason (journalist) book PostCapitalism: A Guide to our Future

PostCapitalism: A Guide to our Future (2015)

Life, People, Learning, Chance

“The hand that signed the paper felled a city;
Five sovereign fingers taxed the breath,
Doubled the globe of dead and halved a country;
These five kings did a king to death.”

Dylan Thomas (1914–1953) Welsh poet and writer

" The Hand that Signed the Paper Felled a City http://www.internal.org/view_poem.phtml?poemID=98", st. 1 (1936)

Death, Dead, Country

“Have you ever wondered, perhaps, why opinions which the majority of people quite naturally hold are, if anyone dares express them publicly, denounced as 'controversial, 'extremist', 'explosive', 'disgraceful', and overwhelmed with a violence and venom quite unknown to debate on mere political issues? It is because the whole power of the aggressor depends upon preventing people from seeing what is happening and from saying what they see.

The most perfect, and the most dangerous, example of this process is the subject miscalled, and deliberately miscalled, 'race'. The people of this country are told that they must feel neither alarm nor objection to a West Indian, African and Asian population which will rise to several millions being introduced into this country. If they do, they are 'prejudiced', 'racialist'... A current situation, and a future prospect, which only a few years ago would have appeared to everyone not merely intolerable but frankly incredible, has to be represented as if welcomed by all rational and right-thinking people. The public are literally made to say that black is white. Newspapers like the Sunday Times denounce it as 'spouting the fantasies of racial purity' to say that a child born of English parents in Peking is not Chinese but English, or that a child born of Indian parents in Birmingham is not English but Indian. It is even heresy to assert the plain fact that the English are a white nation. Whether those who take part know it or not, this process of brainwashing by repetition of manifest absurdities is a sinister and deadly weapon. In the end, it renders the majority, who are marked down to be the victims of violence or revolution or tyranny, incapable of self-defence by depriving them of their wits and convincing them that what they thought was right is wrong. The process has already gone perilously far, when political parties at a general election dare not discuss a subject which results from and depends on political action and which for millions of electors transcends all others in importance; or when party leaders can be mesmerised into accepting from the enemy the slogans of 'racialist' and 'unChristian' and applying them to lifelong political colleagues...

In the universities, we are told that education and the discipline ought to be determined by the students, and that the representatives of the students ought effectively to manage the institutions. This is nonsense—manifest, arrant nonsense; but it is nonsense which it is already obligatory for academics and journalists, politicians and parties, to accept and mouth upon pain of verbal denunciation and physical duress.

We are told that the economic achievement of the Western countries has been at the expense of the rest of the world and has impoverished them, so that what are called the 'developed' countries owe a duty to hand over tax-produced 'aid' to the governments of the undeveloped countries. It is nonsense—manifest, arrant nonsense; but it is nonsense with which the people of the Western countries, clergy and laity, but clergy especially—have been so deluged and saturated that in the end they feel ashamed of what the brains and energy of Western mankind have done, and sink on their knees to apologise for being civilised and ask to be insulted and humiliated.

Then there is the 'civil rights' nonsense. In Ulster we are told that the deliberate destruction by fire and riot of areas of ordinary property is due to the dissatisfaction over allocation of council houses and opportunities for employment. It is nonsense—manifest, arrant nonsense; but that has not prevented the Parliament and government of the United Kingdom from undermining the morale of civil government in Northern Ireland by imputing to it the blame for anarchy and violence.

Most cynically of all, we are told, and told by bishops forsooth, that communist countries are the upholders of human rights and guardians of individual liberty, but that large numbers of people in this country would be outraged by the spectacle of cricket matches being played here against South Africans. It is nonsense—manifest, arrant nonsense; but that did not prevent a British Prime Minister and a British Home Secretary from adopting it as acknowledged fact.”

Enoch Powell (1912–1998) British politician

The "enemy within" speech during the 1970 general election campaign; speech to the Turves Green Girls School, Northfield, Birmingham (13 June 1970), from Still to Decide (Eliot Right Way Books, 1972), pp. 36-37.
1970s

Pain, People, World, Education

“Women are the tax we pay on pleasure”

Adolfo Bioy Casares (1914–1999) Argentine novelist

"Las mujeres son el impuesto que pagamos por el placer."
Una muñeca rusa, 1991.

Women, Pleasure

“All these actions will require sacrifice on the part of every one of us if we are to get over this dangerous period without intolerable risk. The simplest form of this sacrifice would be the payment of more taxes to support a larger defense budget. It is difficult to estimate how much money will be required to close the gap of our inferiority at the maximum possible rate, but I would suggest that we are talking in terms of a budget between $50 and $55 billion a year for the next five years. Once the gap is closed, subsequent budgets will not need be so high. This requirement for a bigger budget will exist regardless of any transitory shift in Soviet attitude and behavior. There is no living with communism as an inferior.”

Maxwell D. Taylor (1901–1987) United States general

Source: The Uncertain Trumpet (1960), p. 178-179

Money, Behavior, Communication, Support

“There may be those who wish to hear more — more promises to this group or that — more harsh rhetoric about the men in the Kremlin — more assurances of a golden future, where taxes are always low and subsidies ever high. But my promises are in the platform you have adopted — our ends will not be won by rhetoric and we can have faith in the future only if we have faith in ourselves.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

1960, The New Frontier

Men, Faith, Future

“I do not want to see a negro man walk to the polls and vote on who should handle my tax money, while I myself cannot vote at all. Is that fair?”

Rebecca Latimer Felton (1835–1930) American politician

[Dittmer, John, Black Georgia in the Progressive Era, 1900-1920, 1980, University of Illinois Press, Urbana, 978-0-252-00813-9, http://books.google.com/books?id=mW4gKvP1oZkC&lpg=PA121&dq=rebecca%20latimer%20felton%20see%20a%20negro%20man&pg=PA121#v=onepage&q=rebecca%20latimer%20felton%20see%20a%20negro%20man&f=false, 121].

Money

“Private shops [in Soviet Russia]... are taxed higher than co-operatives, are granted less favorable concessions, and enjoy a grudging legality. Nevertheless, their owners often make a great deal of money. The only explanation for it is the shortage of goods and the hunger for them. When one asks for the explanation of such a phenomenon in an agricultural country one is told: The government is exporting grain, the milk or egg price is too low and the peasants are holding back.”

Dorothy Thompson (1893–1961) American journalist and radio broadcaster

Source: "The New Russia" 1928, p. 23

Money, Hunger, Country

“You have failed to consider the ramifications of the solutions and pose a problem that simply would not exist if you did. This taxes my patience, which is already legendary in its general absence.”

Erik Naggum (1965–2009) Norwegian computer programmer

Re: XML and lisp http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.lisp/msg/06d4be5b6f5bc154 (Usenet article). Usenet articles, Miscellaneous

Problem, Patience

“The people in every state in this country should have the right to determine who they want as president and what the agenda of the Democratic Party should be. That’s why we are in this race until the last vote is cast. That is why this campaign is going to the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia with as many delegates as possible to fight for a progressive party platform that calls for a $15 an hour minimum wage, an end to our disastrous trade policies, a Medicare-for-all health care system, breaking up Wall Street financial institutions, ending fracking in our country, making public colleges and universities tuition free and passing a carbon tax so we can effectively address the planetary crisis of climate change.”

Bernie Sanders (1941) American politician, senator for Vermont

Statement on his candidacy (27 April 2016) http://www.mediaite.com/online/sanders-emphasizes-fight-for-progressive-party-platform-in-primary-night-statement/ 2010s, 2016

People, Health, Universe, Change

“Tax crimes should be investigated by the tax bureau, not through secret police detention.”

Ai Weiwei (1957) Chinese concept artist

“ At home: Ai Weiwei http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/6fdcaae6-5959-11e1-abf1-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1nQPAYr26..” Financial Times, February 24, 2012. 2010-, 2012

Secret

“It is unconscionable that this government charges more royalty on the sale of our very own natural gas from Malampaya than it taxes imported coal and fuel. We pay P1.40 per kilowatt hour for electricity from generated from natural gas and only P.17 per KWH from coal. Does that make any sense to you?”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

2009, Speech: The Socio-Economic Peace Program of Senator Francis Escudero

Nature, Sense

Quotes about tax page 6

Quotes about tax
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