How They Did It - Paying Taxes in Ancient Rome
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- Опубліковано 6 кві 2018
- We step back in time to take a look at how taxes worked in Ancient Rome. This documentary covers the system of taxation during the Roman Republic and Empire!
Sources:
The Roman Market Economy by Peter Temin
The Ancient Economy by M. I. Finley
Taxes and Trade in the Roman Empire (200 B.C.-A.D. 400) by Keith Hopkins
Music:
"Quirky Comedy" by 8th Mode Music
If you are interested in more "How They Did It" episodes, check out our growing playlist: ua-cam.com/play/PLkOo_Hy3liEKUONCNxFP1q-sLmTqOisJZ.html As always let me know what topics you would like to see in the future!
Our playlist?
Well I do have a Moments episode in the works about how the Legions prepared meals which will touch on the supply system. Should be interesting
I have some people helping on parts of the channel so I wanted to use "our" to account for them : )
The legend in the graphic at 3:40 is the wrong way round. Vlearly the client kingdoms are shown in green e.g. Ptolemaic Egypt. And the Roman provinces are in the tan colour such as Cisapline Gaul.
Otherwise nice video
EDIT: Sorry for being such a pendant and spotting that one flaw.
Hey, Invicta, could you do a video no one ever does? A video explaining Diocletian's Reforms and the Legions of the Late Roman Empire or even the Byzantine Empire.
I now understand more about paying taxes in ancient Rome than I understand about paying taxes today.
The Raff I know how you feel 😂
Here's the short of taxes:
Government collects money to keep public services (roads, water, sewage, police, hospitals, schools, military etc.) running. The amount is based on what is needed to keep these things running, with reserves to fight disasters.
Corrupted individuals and miss communication hamper this effort, often costing taxpayer more than the estimate.
And that's it.
themurmeli88 I know what taxes do lol, it's a joke about how bureaucratic the process is. The US tax code is 3,000+ pages.
The Raff I hear you, bureaucracy kills faster than anthrax.
freddo 1614 *ancap meme*
If they so often relied on brute force to get the money they had promised to collect, and the corruption associated with it, then it's no wonder the tax collectors were so disliked, as described in the gospels!
Yep, they took Jesus's Lunch money, that's why he had to feed 2 fish and three loaves of bread to 20000 people.
Everyone likes the benefits of taxes, but no one likes to pay.
@SigneN-Formaldehyd-Planteøstrogen-Soja#1-dræ' If no one paid their taxes, you wouldn't even have schools or hospitals, you wouldn't even have a country.
@SigneN-Formaldehyd-Planteøstrogen-Soja#1-dræ' Apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system, and public health - what have the Romans ever done for us?
@SigneN-Formaldehyd-Planteøstrogen-Soja#1-dræ' It's a bit from Monty Python, satarizing people like you. Maybe you're the one that needs to grow up, and get a sense of humor.
Could you do a video on how Rome managed logistics of such a huge city in such an ancient time - for example - water management, Food supply, waste manage, policing, maintenance of public property etc.. The engineering and economic aspects of these things have always made me wonder...
finally someone appreciates my tax reforms
gratias ago tibi Invicta
Meanwhile 2018 years later I pay £190 road tax and then smash my car up on a pothole.
Jesus Christ Dude, I don't know if you know but... you've been dead for a good 2000+ Years.
No, I come back lad. That's what Easter is about. And to the other chap. I can turn water into wine, I can't remember half the shit I've said.
" I come back lad. "
Yeah, No...
Are you saying Easter is bollocks?
Don't listen to them Jesus, they know not what they say, or some shit like that. You know what I mean.
A note about Late Antiquity Roman taxation especially during Diocletian's reign:
The Roman coins had become so diluted in their purity that they became practically worthless. Diocletian and his predecessors, like Aurelian, eventually phased out most of these "bad" coins in favor of simple barter. Then Diocletian created an unprecedented bureaucratic apparatus (at least in Roman history) that had officials go to all the corners of the empire and value virtually every item owned and produced by the locals. They assigned a value to all of them and compared those values with each other. For example, X number of chickens would equate to Y number of pigs. Once that was set, Diocletian's administration decreed taxation targets to villages and communities. This had a negative effect in that certain communities became too specialized in a limited number of produce but they also, presumably, made better qualities of those items. But the transparency and efficiency of the system gave a breath of life to the economy as patricians were NOTORIOUS for dodging taxes through bribes and threats. While the new system didn't entirely solve the problem, patricians still didn't pay most of their taxes, it gave the Roman Empire enough money to revive itself from financial ruin. So in a weird way, Diocletian and the Late Roman Empire pioneered centralized planning and bureaucratic taxation. And come on, let's give the late empire some love! You don't deserve Rome at its best if you can't handle it at its worst.
Very interesting.
@@InternetMameluq Indeed
If you were taxed in chickens would you really work extra hard to raise better chickens or would you try to merely fill the quota so you could have more time to see to your other needs? It isn't as though the bureaucrats are looking for a deal and you have to compete with other chicken farmers.
Imagine the good times had by tax assessors in establishing the value and comparative values of prostitutes.
> "Diocletian and the Late Roman Empire pioneered centralized planning and bureaucratic taxation. And come on, let's give the late empire some love! "
That's a BAD thing!
An interesting & different take on the corruption of tax collectors would be a video on Charlemagne's way of handling it, later on. A vid on the system he implemented, to curb corrupt tax collectors, would be an interesting counterpoint.
Alright. What did he do?
Anco77 Most likely had them tortured
No please don't because Charlemagne was racist against Jews.
And that's why his story shouldn't be told? Get the fuck out of here. I don't care. But then again I don't think you were serious. You weren't, right?
+boobio1
So was almost everyone. That means you can tell anyone's story through a lot of history: because everyone (even the most tolerant of people by their days' standards) was racist in one way or another by modern standards.
This gives a good understanding why Levi in the Bible was so despised by his own people as a tax collector. He would charge more than necessary and "line" his pockets with how much he overcharged them.
"Don't forget to pay your taxes."
That's one reason why governments moved to payroll withholding.
The other reason: it taxes the poorest the hardest, and the richest, it's just taking a few annual drips from their seething pot, instead of a piece of the pot itself.
Funny thing though, most states and other nations have property tax that always includes real-estate, your home.
Most of the wealth belongs to the very top 1%, but most of their wealth isn't real-estate, but stocks, that in most nations including the US isn't part of the property tax. Most rest of us wealth is in our house and vehicles... that gets taxed.
Because it's okay for the plutocrats to tax their homes, as their few drips from their pot is more than enough to pay for it without giving any piece of that pot.
As for the rest of us... well it sucks.
But wealth tax on other things that most of the rest of us don't own, but mostly the rich... can't tax that, might cramp their style.
Taxation is theft.
@@jmitterii2 All taxation is theft. No need to play this petty game about how “some taxes suck more than others”. Sure that may be true, but is it not true that it is all some form of plunder upon peaceful people?
@@jorden9821 you could look at taxes as a form of extortion, in the same manner that the mafia won't beat you up if you pay the protection money, as the state won't throw you in prison if you pay up. But look on the other side, in most western countries you have fire departments that you want around, they are paid in taxes in the west, which frankly i view as a good thing, rather than hanging a metal plaque outside telling the fire departement that you are part of their costumer base. Even if the politicians take a cut.
@@tiemenpost3725 Whether or not good things are provided doesn't make stealing and extortion okay. Also you didn't stop to think if those things were possible without a monopoly/without coercion and force.
Privatize taxation. What could go wrong?
Wouldn't private taxation be not taxation?
@@historiculgeomocule5569 They weren't privatizing the taxes, they were privatizing the collection of taxes. Your taxes are still going to the government, they are just being collected by private contractors acting on behalf of the government.
@cold45acp Yes, I truly would love to live in a land with no government services, whatsoever. "Oh, you can't pay the egregious sanitation bill for the services of our sewage management monopoly which the government has no way of breaking up because this is a libertarian paradise with no government regulation or involvement in economic affairs of any kind whatsoever? Guess we'll just pump sewage into your home. Tough shit" *laughs in Laissez-Faire bullshit*
@cold45acp and were is here exactly, the middle of the US that no one gives a single shit about with a population of 2 every 10 miles on a 100-mile grid
cold45acp too many taxes is no good, but too few taxes is also no good. Without taxes a large society cannot function properly.
Incredibly good topic, enjoyed it a lot... the quality you produce is unmatched anywhere, from TV to Series to UA-cam. My hat is off
"Collects fees"
Extorts protection money
Funfact: during the whole zombie apocalypse craze, the US government actually did an evaluation on the impact of a zombie outbreak. Among many things, the report stated that they found no way for the military to hold back the outbreak beyond 30 days and secondly they developed procedures in place for the IRS to resume normal tax collection within 30 days of an outbreak.
Great episode : ) Like that fact that you are discussing topics that are normally not covered in too much detail. Great work.
Thank you so much for this very helpful video. Your enthusiasm for the ancient world is clearly conveyed in all your videos, and that makes you an excellent teacher!
I collect Roman coins, so it's fascinating to see what might have happened to them as they circulated. As I live in the UK, I assume the earlier ones were mostly used to pay soldiers, but my more recent (Constantinian and the like) would probably have been circulated among citizens and taxed in such a way.
5018 A.D.
How They Did It - Avoiding Taxes in 21st Century Greece
You really came a long way, from this relaxed and insecure feeling of a narrator to a precise and objective narrator
I feel like it went from a high schooler to a professional in just four years. Truly a great progress
i can’t describe how amazing this content is, you’re a blessing
I should head to bed... Ohhhh! What's this random video about the Roman tax system in my suggested content box!
Is this why people don't come over...?
Okay, i bite, how did ancient China collect taxes?
Poll tax. First of all there were government official assigned to each province. I do mean province of modern size, not the ancient Roman Province. Hukou, or registered residence, last for 5000 years till today, meant X kg of rice/wheat would be collected every year, on top of any annual labour duty. Provinces near the border, would sometime be replaced by military villages whereby farmers were exempt from tax duty in lieu of military duty when called upon. Again, Hukou was also very important for roll call. It also meant "cash rich" inner provinces would be supporting the border provinces through centralised tax revenue.
Chine-easily!! Lol. Yeah. You totally walked into that one.
They made you pay based on how big your eyes got when they gave you the noodle bill. Thus they all have small eyes.
Ancient Chinese governments held regular censuses to record how much property each family owned. This is why they could tax each citizen directly, thus achieving more efficient administration in the local level. Of course, corruption was still rampant, with powerful, rich people always trying to conceal their properties, or bribe local officials to force the poorer people pay the taxes for them, but the system more or less functioned for 2000 years.
Apart from poll tax, emperors sustained themselves by monopolising necessities, especially salt and steel, and incomes from these often accounted for half of the yearly imperial budget. In inland regions far from sources of salt, salt would trade for today's equivalent of $200/lb and beyond in the worst of times. By extension, pickles, salted fish etc. also fell under the monopoly. Reason - it costs less to go after a single salt vendor for $1000 than hunt down 1000 farmers for $1 each with tax collectors.
Fascinating. Thank you for the research and reporting.
This was great! Diving into the details is a lot of fun!
Invicta i love what your channel has molded into its so refreshing to see videos of the everyday life of history and not just the military aspect even though that is awesome to :)
I wish you all the luck in the world and thank you for your hard work on these amazing videos its always a pleasure to watch with a cup of tea and a chocolate digestive haha
I hope one day you could do some videos of the life in Roman Britain that would be amazing :P
No wonder I hear so much about Roman taxes being crazy. It was cause of the publicani and other intermediaries.
yup, I would always read about the huge imposition of taxes on the provinces but never understood the mechanisms behind it.
Invicta and it gives the few plausible and non-religious-bullshit stories in the bible a lot better historical context.
Almost like democrat private contractors.
I would say that it also gives the Bible even more credibility (no surprise there).
There's also accounts of corrupt governors (and senators and random other influential Romans) just taking stuff they wanted when in the provinces. After all, they were Roman citizens protected under Roman law and any legal way of stopping them required getting another influential Roman to represent you in court, which was seldom cheap or easy. Marcus Tullius Cicero prosecuted a corrupt governor (of Sicily) for free, but he did it as much to show off his incredible oratory by demolishing the famous defense lawyer, considered Rome's best, as for any other reason. Cicero could pick any case he wanted after that.
Excellent Video! Keep up the good work! Love the focus on Rome in the recent videos!
Great video, I just wish it was longer! haha. VERY underrated channel with great content
Just discover your channel! Love it!
Welcome aboard! I produce several different style history videos here. This one is supposed to be a bit more casual and accessible
Rome total war lead me here...! Amazing job....your videos are awesome. I upload myself but just battles. Cheers mate thanks for anwering.
During Diocletian's reign Rome experienced hyper inflation. This happened because Rome just stamped out to many coins and stopped using precious metals in the coins. He had to make tax reforms where as instead of paying with the worthless currency people paid directly with goods and services. He made this enormous list of everything from chickens, mules, wheat, ect. and the list had Tax credits allotted for said goods. The amount of credits you got per items could change. If for example everyone started paying in chickens the amount of tax credits you would get for a chicken would go down but if they didn't have enough rice the amount of tax credit you would get for a pound of rice would increase. So tax credit kind of took the place of coins as currency. This saved Rome for a while otherwise they had no way to pay their military.
Another thing Diocletian tried to control the hyper inflation that failed terribly though was he made another huge list. This list again had every good and service of value but this list show said items Maximum value. The idea was to make it illegal to charge more for an item that its listed maximum value was a serious crime punishable by death. However nobody took this list seriously and still charged whatever fair market value was for a said item. Thankfully Diocletian gave up on this terrible idea.
Marty Moose
Hmm. It seems that Diocletian was a bit of a socialist. Wanting to control the economy by setting prices. Planned economies always fail.
@@thotslayer9914 Lol, Intelligent comments only. Please take your place with the communists.
@@UlpianHeritor most of diocletian’s bureaucratic reforms didnt fail, far from it. It generated a stable supply of money to the millitary curbed corruption and greatly gave confidence back in the roman state. Art and recovered manuscripts in his day were very optimistic and hopeful for a better future. It was just this one thing that didnt work and just kind of happened and whiffed it’s not like it crashed the economy or anything. Supply and demand wasn’t a grasped concept untill the 1600s you know?
Changing currency when one fails is often a tactic of these elites throughout time, unfortunately for them currency stability isn't the only problem with hyperinflation. The real problem is market distortions, and the fact that minting money ≠ minting goods to coincide that coinage. Huge losses, big wealth transfers upward towards some type of prioritized elite, not enough real goods to sustain, upheaval amongst the people results as people starve.
@@kl6544 Fair enough, I can definitely give them a pass, sucks that modern politicians act like it's impossible to grasp these most basic economic concepts. Digging a grave for us knowing Switzerland will always exist for them to hop in their private jets to.
Very interesting video. Thank you for creating this video, i hope to see far more! :D
This is great! Way to expand your horizons into a new series, that’s how you stay alive!
This is not ancient economics, but it is ancient thuggery. Today the art has been improved.
Is the evolution of the Roman legion part 2 ever coming?
Doesn't look like it...
love all these videos invicta, keep up the great work!
This was great! please do more videos on this and similar topics!
"and finally, don't forget to pay your taxes"
*whistles*
Tax collection was privatized . Amazing!
As it is now increasingly in the EU.
Great video man, feels like you put a lot of effort into it
Great channel. Would be great to see the evolution of different topics you cover, over the years. Like taxes, bathrooms, logistics, everyday tasks, etc... in the roman times, middle ages, renaissance, XVII century, industrial revolution, early XX century, etc
And now we're oppressed not just by the financial burden, but by hideous amounts of unnecessary paperwork.
pixel girl - It's all just theft under color of Law.
ger du, if people are going to be dishonest, they're still going to be dishonest if given mountains of paperwork. But you are right in that I have a general "fuck authority" attitude - if a person or organisation wants my respect, let alone my obedience, they must earn it. "Because I say so and I have guns" is not a good moral argument.
Government over all are no different than mob involved into a protection rackets, you pay or else...
Olivia Williams, to be fair governments are a mixed bag. So many people constitute one that they're never going to be all bad or all good, but the job of politician does seem to mostly attract either sociopaths or idealists. The latter are responsible for things like the nationalised healthcare that keeps most people in the UK healthy, or the social welfare system that cares for vulnerable people like me, those who are too disabled to work. Without those things, I'd be dead. Of course, the far right don't really like ideas like that, so those two things are of course things that the UK's current Conservative government has been trying to destroy for the past seven years. The psychopaths are trying to tear down what the idealists built up.
Statist seem to have a hard time understanding that there is no such thing as government other than the willingness of the populace to be governed.
Private property is a physical fact. Government is a shell game that only truly exists in our minds.
Your infographic with client kingdoms vs Roman provinces has the colors backwards.
Really interesting! Thanks for sharing this.
Incredible channel. Keep up the war videos and all these interesting ones too and you’ll have an incondicional subscriber.
" _Privatised Tax collection_ " (USA starts frothing at the mouth)
The magic of free market in action.
HiddenUtopia Taxes are literally the opposite of the concept of a free market cause you don’t have any choice in the transaction, and if you don’t do it you get imprisoned. Plus, the government doesn’t tell you how much you owe, you have to figure that out yourself.
Neither do people choose their class/race/ethnicity/etc at birth. But that doesn't stop libertarians from hating the poor.
non sequitur. Taxes are set by government it isn't natural like one's parentage. The poor would actually benefit from libertarian goals like the removal of payroll tax that makes it expensive to hire them and occupational licensing that makes it illegal for them to do jobs like barbering without jumping through a bunch of hoops first.
>the poor would benefit from the rich getting richer
That is simply not true.
At 7:00. So Lindybeige was a tax collector in an earlier life. Who knew?
they dont even look alike
I liked the video and hope to see more of them in particular how the common people coped with taxation.
Great video, also I love the use of Asterix font throughout the video.
"More money more problems" = "STOP COUNTING MY SHEEP ROMAN SWINE!!"
I would like to see a video about a typical estate for someone in the equite social class.
really well done, well explained video!
Love your videos.. Thanks & keep making them,,, PLEASE...!!
Publicani = Bounty Hunters
more like state sanctioned robbing
bounty hunter ua-cam.com/video/rIAe1MbfGk8/v-deo.html
There more akin to Private Debt Collectors really. So it may seem odd at first glance but is not so different from how it works in many countries today.
Thomas McCarthy yes, why?
ua-cam.com/video/DwCMKmE3pQ8/v-deo.html
The lesson is DON'T PRIVATIZE COLLECTION OF TAX REVENUE!!
Or anything really.
Niko Ništa
Nope.
Niko Ništa No, that's just stupid. The government coudlnt even run a baseball stadium in the US. Or even the postal system.
Oddly enough the government can run the irs just fine, it is the most efficient agency the government has because f there's one thing they're good at, it's stealing our money.
I'd also note that with all the taxes we have today it doesn't even matter that the privat system was so corrupted, they still probably taxed the people less than we are taxed today, if you're wealthy you're probably losing 50% of your income, and then losing even more every time you buy a product, or for having property, or for many incredibly stupid reasons like some of the environmental bs that the government taxes you for. Then note that inflation is also a tax, the difference being that they steal it more quietly because they steal the value of your money instead of the actual dollar bills.
love the video mate truly amazing
I would love to see more of these. You sir, have a new subscriber.
constantine changed the system and people were paying taxes once every 5 years if I am not mistaken... but the tax was much higher! also diocletian imposed the tax to the trading of products and so trade suffered and a form of feudalism started as if you didnt trade you didnt have to pay taxes... it is really interesting topic...
and as always the rich didnt pay their taxes hehe
There’s no way the Publicani had the riskless huge profits the video implies.
If that was true, the other Publicani would just up their bids. The presence of competition among Publicani would ensure limits to profits, and make sure it was risky.
Also revolts happening
Something I've always been curious about is how high medieval European monarchies levied, paid for, maintained and equipped armies. Of course, every single different nation (and even provinces!) had different laws and requirements, but I'd like to get a general overview.
You're just generally really thorough and all your topics are well researched. I really appreciate this video and your channel generally!
I love learning about historical economics. Thank you. =)
It's funny how even in Joe Black they make a joke about this, you can certainly evade taxes if you got the balls, Capone just failed.
But you cannot run from the devil.
Yes, "the system of tax farming."
We are still farm animals.
I love the new videos, great job :D
Good work!
Mmm, interesting. So basically if you steal all the wealth of an area or province when you conquer it before adding that said province into your empire, you can afford to give them a lower tax rate and use it as an excuse to say "Hey you should be happy, you have low taxes." "Hey Gaul, we took over your 300 gold mines. Now we have so much money, we only need to tax you 1%!!"
More like, hey we literally enslaved and raped and plundered XYZ% of your population, reduced the size and seized property of your elite, now we can tax you...
Vae victis and shit, man.
Very interesting. So generally citizens need to pay only 1-3% taxes???
Vinod Varghese
Yes, but not based on income (Like we do), but on your wealth.
Basically you had to give 1-3% of your total wealth/net worth to the state
Germongoloid Ah OK. That makes sense. I think that's a very interesting approach.
Germongoloid for most thats signifigantly lower.
Unless you have property then your screwed.
Of wealth tax, which would be considerably less for 95% of people.
TheSunkenCommander nah, if you were wealthy, you could just bribe the officials to assess your property lower.
I never thought I would find tax interesting, but you proved me wrong. Well done.
When you look at tax as large scale theft it immediately becomes “interesting” to say the least 😂
Very interesting. Thank you.
Lol, these publicani sound like suuuch a bad idea!! xD
Taxation is objectively not theft. It is your subscription fee to civilization.
You want the benefits of being part of a society? You pay for those benefits. That's what taxation is.
Good work guys !
wow this is such an informal narration, i loved it :) Very different from the rest of your videos.
Also nice easter egg at the end :P
why the map on 3:30 is so distorted? God my brain is so annoyed seeing anatolia so nort-east
Samed Mamedli Because thats how the earth really looks mate. Normal maps are distorted since they dont account for the curvature of the earth.
Nice humble brag
@@luukas2660 All 2D map projections are flawed, only way to represent in s truly correct way is with a globe
I think "paying" seems like the wrong word somehow.
This is the video i was waiting for.
LOVE the casual tone!
Still not convinced about a HC collab some are asking for. I love you both, but I don't see you together.
Do a video on Cicero
“Could pay thugs to collect the taxes” modern day IRS
Ancient economics is awesome! Keep em coming!
This looks like a fantastic channel. Subscribed. :)
Tax man is coming. Move the house. Send the slaves on vacation.
Ok - To the brilliant people who keeps saying "taxation is theft".
Theft only makes sense in a society where laws are uphold and rights are protected. That has only existed in the context of some form of state or community. And all those have in common that some form of taxation existed. Either monetarily or through forced labour.
If you don't have a community to protect your rights, nobody will ever care whether someone took your wallet at gunpoint, your only rights outside of society are the laws of nature, and the wolves and lions will eat you in that world.
No taxation no society.
Artemisia Mobsters taxing you is a good society then? You can hire private police in the UK for as little as £1 per week, and back in the day Ireland had Brehon Law, meaning you could choose your judge. It was a system of voluntary exchange, no theft needed. Ever hear those stories where cops end up killing or beating the shit out of people who phoned them in the first place? Can you imagine that happening whenever you directly pay the officers and can go elsewhere if you don't like the service? All for a fraction of the current taxes expropriated from the citizens.
So you're saying Ireland didn't have taxes? And it's not private police in UK, it's private security, they are merely taking advantage of the legal framework created by the state in the first place. And please provide statistics of police killing people who phoned them in the first place.
And in a society with private officers, you're not going to be beaten up by your protectors. They're just going to take your house and your belongings. You can try pay different officers, but you're out of money because the other private security took it from you, and most likely no one is willing to take you up on that offer, because that would mean going to war with the private secrutiy firm that took your property.
You can hate a state all you want, but the state is the only instance where even if you own absolutely nothing, people will still defend your rights, because you're a citizen.
People do not need a government which oppresses its people, a govt which styles itself with absolute power and control and engineering societal needs, nor that run by corrupt politicians lining their pockets or their creditors'. Taxation was once not yearly. Taxation or tribute were demanded from colonies to sustain the excess of a state and/or its people.
The principle sounds good, but real life application is different. It can not only be theft, but also tyranny, and a tool of destruction
I never said your government can't steal from you, never said taxation couldn't be theft. I said that the lazy statement "Taxation is theft" is false, because for it to be true all kinds of taxation are theft.
But all kinds of taxation is theft.
Coming from a catholic school background I kind of knew about the privatization of taxes in the Roman Empire since those were the tax collectors mentioned in the Bible. Really cool to fully understand now.
Great video keep up the good work
Oh by the Gods! The amount of people uttering the phrase "Taxation is theft!" is nauseating!
Megas Alexandros i think most are trying to be edgy. The one or two serious ones are using bad arguments and avoiding answering the tough questions.
But it is!
But it is theft.
Taxation is the price of Civilization. If you want your country to be a Democratic Republic instead of a failed states ruled by local War lord and Gangs, You will pay taxes. The real question should be on how Taxes are levied. Ya'll can watch my Video about Land Value Taxation for the least bad tax.
JascRambles it's no more than your oppinion. At least here, you haven't shown any argument supporting it. And, just for your knowledge, the State itself, even a democratic one, is a gang. It is finnanced by stolen money (consult a dictionary for the deffinition of theft and the one for taxation, compare them and see for yourself). What makes it worse than a common gang? It claims and has the monopoly of the use of strenght (and crime): the state (the individuals who run it) is the only one who can legaly acquire properties from the other individuals.
People don't need to be robbed to be civilised. It's a thing only in your mind.
The legal mafia both then and now. It's funny how we expect the private sector to continuously give us better for less, phones, cars, computers, even people finding ways to make houses cheaper by factory building etc. Food prices from 80-90% a person's wage to less than 10 (if they're weren't so many government tariffs they'd be cheaper), clothes at a fraction they used to cost etc. But governments keep getting bigger and needing more money to operate, when years ago they managed to do the same services taxing a smaller percentage. It's a money pit. And those involved with it often take as much as they can get from it.
Actually it's not. The biggest rubric on the budget is Social Security, followed by Medicare. Non defense spending is also higher than defense.
Irish Jester I don't live in the US, and I wish we had the option of opting out and paying my own way, there is no social contract, there are no agreements between people and their government. I think it's crazy, especially in this modern day, that part of the population can force the rest of the population to live as they want to live. Often a 40% figure dominates a land. How about the government a person votes for taxes and supplies them their services, and if a person's wants to higher their own private police (a £1 a week in the UK last I looked) who won't automatically treat them like a criminal instead of being taxed multiples of that for an abusive police force then they can go for it. In Ireland under Brehon Law people choose their judges and it was expected that those of higher standing knew more of the law and would be treated harsher. Why have government tax us to pay private companies build roads when we can just pay them directly and save money on government? Etc etc etc.
Little Cripple: don’t you think those two things are related? (Government getting bigger and private industry getting bigger)
The thing with private roads, we have those here in the states. Often they are toll roads and me must pay every time we drive over them 🙁
A corrupt government is pretty capitalist, though. Politicians just want to make a profit off of the citizens. They compete with each other to stay in power and take more money.
R Vanzo... thats funny... I looked up social security and unemployment spending. Its is significantly smaller than the military budget. And I'm looking at the 2015 American spending budget.
Love your work!
I hope your making more of these
Taxation is the price we have to pay for proper societies to exist. Without taxation, there won't be a government system, no laws, no infrastructure, no healthcare system, no educational system, no security, no bureaucracy keeping track of population and land etc. etc. Paying your taxes is to support stability in your country. Taxation is the one part of the basis of every civilization that ever existed. The ancient Egyptians paid their taxes with goods or work, the Greeks and Romans with coin and nowadays we pay with 1's and 0's using our computers and internet banking.
Ya ya right, but you know government uses our taxes for something else for unnecessary and tons of money wasted.
+Dooyong Park
simply because you 'dont like it' doesn't necessarily means 'they use it wrong'
what? you want them to be invested in your specific neighborhood only and your well-being above others?
I cannot mention everything here but there are many parts the government pays and has nothing to do with benefit's life of common people.
Dooyong Park that's not a problem with taxation, that's a problem with your government. The answer isn't get rid of taxes, it's fix your government.
I think you live in the US and you don't get what your problem with your tax money anyway.
#TaxationIsTheft
Hey since you brought it up near the end, how about an episode on classical Chinese bureaucracy? Would be a good complimentary episode!
Love your content!
God I hate taxes
DrewLSsix This seriously isn’t your argument is it?
Brando Lebean he's a bit blunt and overstating his point, but the point itself is very much correct.
Taxation is not theft in the exact same context as rent and utility fees are not theft.
Tax is the utility fee of state and nation-level infrastructure, and if you don't want to pay it, you are free to go off the grid, into whatever uninhabited wilderness you desire and live exclusively off the land as a hermit hunter/gatherer or self-sufficient farmer.
Taxation is ok, the problem is where that money ends, for example, a goverment raise gets 1 million in taxes and uses it to build a new road, then it decides that its not worth and sells the road to a random company for 500.000, then the company gets 1 million annually.
Or giving trillions to banks, while they clap
Personally I do not mind paying taxes. But that is likely because is very easy to do so here and I actually have plenty of money after. And I live in one of those countries that have very high taxes and living cost in general. But you know. We actually get something back from that taxation. We have a smooth running economy. A lot of cheep or free services. And low corruption in general. So when they ask me to sign off on the my tax declaration (because we get it all figured out for us) I look over it quickly then just accept. Smooth and easy.
When thing do not work as smoothy then I get why people get bitter. When you feel corruption eat up all your money. When you have to live from paycheck to paycheck. When you see great divides in society and the government never helps you if you need help. Then I truly get why taxes is just one more form of oppression from a uncaring society.
SonsOfLorgar No you can't do that. Its illegal. All lands unowned lands are public so its illegal to live on them without a permit or paying taxes...plus you still have to pay taxes on your income each years
Only two things certain in life: death and yet another market crash.
t. Joseph Stalin
famine*
Thanks for including your sources
Thank you for the wonderful birthday present. As a writer, this type of history helps me a lot!
glad it could help, I'll definitely be adding more of these videos on daily life which I hope will help enrich your stories
So now every total war player are historians ?
I don't know how I got to your channel but I loved it
Love this Invicta! Could you also do some How They Did Its on civilisations of the near east ?
Loved it!