Re: Why I Pay Too Much in Taxes
At 11:16 PM 5/5/96 -0700, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SANDY SANDFORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
C'punks,
On Sun, 5 May 1996, Alan Horowitz wrote:
didn't the feudal vassels only pay 33% ?
Actually, no. When I used to edit a magazine, I commissioned an article about how much "tax" slaves, serfs, etc. paid. That is, how much of what they produced, did they get to keep; how much went to their masters. The surprising, cross-cultural answer my researcher/writer found was that they got to keep everthing they produced except 5-10%. That's a lot better, percentage-wise, than for modern "tax slaves."
In the early feudal period, ordinary knights did not live well. They were only moderately better off than peasants, and yet to support one knight, you needed a startlingly large number of peasants, a fact that kings were continually unhappy about and continually trying to fix. While it is difficult to assess the tax rate, because taxes were in kind, it was clearly very low by modern standards. --------------------------------------------------------------------- | We have the right to defend ourselves | http://www.jim.com/jamesd/ and our property, because of the kind | of animals that we are. True law | James A. Donald derives from this right, not from the | arbitrary power of the state. | jamesd@echeque.com
James A. Donald wrote:
At 11:16 PM 5/5/96 -0700, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
On Sun, 5 May 1996, Alan Horowitz wrote:
didn't the feudal vassels only pay 33% ?
Actually, no. When I used to edit a magazine, I commissioned an article about how much "tax" slaves, serfs, etc. paid. That is, how much of what they produced, did they get to keep; how much went to their masters. The surprising, cross-cultural answer my researcher/writer found was that they got to keep everthing they produced except 5-10%. That's a lot better, percentage-wise, than for modern "tax slaves."
In the early feudal period, ordinary knights did not live well. They were only moderately better off than peasants, and yet to support one knight, you needed a startlingly large number of peasants, a fact that kings were continually unhappy about and continually trying to fix.
While it is difficult to assess the tax rate, because taxes were in kind, it was clearly very low by modern standards.
Things are sufficiently different that such a comparison might not be meaningful anyway. For example, subtracting subsistence level food, and then figuring tax rates would give a different answer. The amount of work it takes to provide basic needs now is clearly very low by historical standards. Government is big by historical standards. I'll object to only one of those. Jon Leonard
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Jon Leonard