Those Dirty Rotten Taxes : The Tax Revolts that Built America

Rating:
Summary: Not too good
Review: I was very disappointed with this book after hearing positive reveiws from many others. It is hard to take a book seriously that makes controversial historical claims, and then fails to footnote the sources. I found the writing to be dull and many historical facts to be in error. If you are looking for a good book on the history of taxation, do not look here.

Rating:
Summary: Entertaining vignettes of citizens resisting the taxman
Review: This book is for general reading and should not be confused with a scholarly history of taxation. It is a series of chapters that are brief retellings of various historical incidents involving citizens resisting taxation in various ways or citizens being made to suffer through taxation programs. These tellings do have a point of view and historians may find some of them rather blunt and ignoring certain subtleties that might mitigate some of the author's point of view. However, in total the book does make its point that it is up to the citizens to hold the government responsible for its spending and the taxation it levies to pay for that spending.

While I abhor taxation beyond what is absolutely necessary, I think all the arguments about taxes actually function to distract us from the real thing we should be debating and that is government spending. The problem is that the modern state has so many of us on the receiving end of this or that program that we will resist any program that decreases the increase in our program's spending (let alone any actual cuts). So, when someone proposes ANY cut in spending, those being cut raise a loud resistance effort to defeat it. This is why we try and starve the government by cutting taxes - the hope being that the starved beast will not be able to increase the handouts without limit.

Anyway, this can be an entertaining read. There is a list for further reading and an index. Just don't take everything in here as gospel.




Rating:
Summary: one of the best histories I've read in a while
Review: This book lay on my shelf some time before I finally got to it. Probably the word "taxes" sounds of bordom and generally negative overtones, but as I finish this book tonight I have found that I thoroughly enjoyed it. I highly recommend it to the history buff and tax-hater in all of us, excepting democrats [socialist], of course. The chapters dealing with the War for Southern Independence are especially interesting: Lincoln and the so-called moral North get a good ol woodshed whooping. One they deserve--for we all know that money and not morals has always been their priority. A great great book.

Rating:
Summary: Not too good
Review: This book lay on my shelf some time before I finally got to it. Probably the word "taxes" sounds of bordom and generally negative overtones, but as I finish this book tonight I have found that I thoroughly enjoyed it. I highly recommend it to the history buff and tax-hater in all of us, excepting democrats [socialist], of course. The chapters dealing with the War for Southern Independence are especially interesting: Lincoln and the so-called moral North get a good ol woodshed whooping. One they deserve--for we all know that money and not morals has always been their priority. A great great book.