For the following, I wish to talk about tax money used efficiently and effectively for necessary or seriously important services. In practice, of course, there are forces and mechanisms at work that waste tax revenues and that make government inefficient or ineffective. But (even) if those things could be eliminated, the remainder of this chapter would still apply. "Wasted" tax money and government ineptness and inefficiency are serious problems, and they may even be impossible to eliminate by the nature of any tax system, but I want to examine "taxation" in something that might be considered an ideal theoretical form where tax revenues are used wisely and well -- assuming they and government are necessary.

Taxes seem today to be used for at least three different kinds of theoretical purposes, though these are not necessarily totally distinct from each other:

1) To provide services (nearly) everyone uses (or wants available, for potential cases of need) that they could not easily or feasibly, if at all, buy individually or piecemeal (such as fire or police protection, or air quality monitoring/control). Theoretically people contribute their affordable portion and receive the service as they need or use it. This is not usually a fee per usage basis, though it might be if, in addition to tax revenue, fees are assessed, such as in a metered use of drinking water provided by a municipality. When there is no fee per usage, those who might contribute the least may in some cases use a service the most; and vice versa. Some people may never use the service (e.g., may never have a fire), but they are willing to pay for having the service available as a guard against risk. Some services may be more used by more people than others; e.g., roads are more used than fire departments.

2) To provide a service for special groups, though people outside the groups contribute their tax money. A local government might build a senior citizen center even though not all its citizens are seniors at any one time and even though not all its seniors may use the center. Government might provide schools even though not all the people who pay taxes for schools have children (of school age). 

One theoretical rationale for this kind of tax use is that all the projects collectively might be used by most or all citizens, even though some groups will use one while other groups use different ones, and that it would be too difficult for members of each group to try to coordinate to build what they each want or need. This is a special case of the first tax use above then, since the usage of all the services is simply distributed in groups of some sort which change membership over time, rather than being distributed more randomly to anyone at any time. 

Another theoretical rationale is that even though some groups may benefit directly from a particular service, all citizens might benefit indirectly. For example, a better-educated community conceivably has more products and services available to purchase than would exist in a community with far fewer educated people who are unable to provide as many products or services.

3) To provide services just for those with special needs who cannot afford to provide for their own needs. This may be for merely humane, charitable purposes, whether temporary or more permanent; it may be for a kind of insurance purpose for those who actually have difficulties that all of us have some risk or potential of having occur. Government might, for instance, provide some sort of job-training or job-finding programs; or it may be for an earned benefit of some sort such as health and disability benefits, etc. for veterans, particularly those who may have participated in combat or other risky situations in order to serve or protect the country. Theoretically the services are open to all, though few might need them. And theoretically there is a difference between temporarily helping those who can, to get (back) on their feet and become contributing members of society again, and helping those who cannot get back on their feet at all through no fault of their own. 

If we look at a small economic community, such as the one I described previously where a number of students in a school organize themselves to have better lunches than the cafeteria provides and better than each student can provide himself, we can see that it is very difficult to add students who want to participate when the system is in equilibrium, and it is very difficult when students who are participating opt out of the system. I am talking about those situations when they do not occur simultaneously, so that one person can simply replace another and easily allow the system to stay in equilibrium.

So in our system, one student makes a meat dish or sandwich, another makes dessert, a third makes vegetables, a fourth brings something to drink, another brings some sort of fruit dish, etc. We can make the system and the meals as simple or elaborate as we want, but what I want to consider is when the system is working perfectly such that everyone has a lunch s/he really enjoys and feels it is worth the labor and cost in terms of what they are providing. I want to call this the equilibrium position. It could occur with two students. It could occur with three students. It could occur with ten students. It can be a full trade system where everyone included trades an item with everyone else who is included; or it can be a trade system where individual participants trade with those whom they want to trade, but not everyone trades with everyone in order to have each item provided. For example, someone who makes soup may not want desserts, but since the dessert maker doesn't want soup, that is okay. The point is that everyone is satisfied with the arrangement as it stands and no one feels s/he is overworked or underpaid.

What I want to consider are the following two cases:

(A) A student from outside the system wants to be included in it.
(B) A student in the system wants to quit the system or participate to a lesser degree; e.g., is willing to give up the vegetables or the dessert.

For the student to opt into a system at equilibrium, an easy way to do it would be for him to offer something everyone (or, more precisely, everyone from whom he wants something) wants, so that they each produce one more of what they are making, and trade it to him for what he provides. Then the system will be back in equilibrium with the original participants working a little more but receiving more in return.

When the other students are already at full capacity, it will not be possible for the system to include the new student unless some original participants change whether or how they trade with at least one of the other participants. Suppose the new student offers a different kind of sandwich and that the dessert-maker prefers it. If they begin trading, then the original sandwich maker now is out of the dessert loop, unless he can trade a sandwich he makes to someone for their dessert. This can become complicated or impossible to work out, depending on who wants what and what each person is willing to give up having in place of it. 

When someone wants to cut back in the system or to opt out of it altogether, it again will often be difficult or impossible to establish equilibrium. Suppose the dessert maker wants to opt out or to cut back, but everyone else still wants desserts. Some new arrangement will be necessary among the participants and it may not be easy, or even possible, to work out.

When the economy is bigger and works with money instead of barter, the problems sometimes get masked because, for example, a baker can tell a regular customer (who, say, makes the drinks) he is sold out of eclairs (because a new person came in earlier and bought one or because the baker has tired of making so many), and the drink maker will sell out of drinks before one of the other regulars can get one (or he may have drinks left over if that is what the baker is cutting back on in order to make fewer eclairs. It may be this round-robin can go on indefinitely with no one's realizing what is causing his not being able to have all the things he wants though he has the money to pay for it. But what has happened is that a new entrant into (or someone's cutting back in) the economy has thrown it out of equilibrium in a way that has caused a shortage, likely a rotating or revolving shortage so that not necessarily the same person is inconvenienced or put out of work or unable to buy the same product each time. Even if the new member can make something that helps erase the shortage, it can be difficult to work the system back into a new equilibrium.

If someone moves out of the school district or decides to go back to making his own lunch, the same kind of problem arises. It will be easy to see it in a direct or relatively direct barter system, but in a larger, money based system, it may be more difficult to see other than that each individual will find eclairs, say, missing from the shelves no matter when he goes to buy them. Eclairs will be unavailable, and at some point, people will think they have extra money, but the extra money will turn out to be worthless unless someone else comes into the system to sell something the original people want, and is willing to buy what they are selling.

Money in an economic system makes non-simultaneous transactions easier, and money in an economic system allows different increments of non-commensurate labor to be able to be equated somehow; e.g., a plane can be manufactured, and bought by an airline who hires crews to maintain and operate it, while selling tickets to individual passengers, with financing making building and buying the plane possible - all of which would be virtually impossible to arrange through barter. But the toll for this convenience is that money and labor can get out of sync in ways that do not show where the problem lies. There can be more or less money than labor available at a given time to utilize it at the same value it had. There can be money in someone's possession who has nothing he wants or needs to spend it on. There can be people with labor to give but cannot find or access the people who could use it who also have the money to purchase it with. You can store money for future use, but if the storing of it messes up the economic system's equilibrium in such a way that it puts people out of work, there may not be things to buy with it that one wants later, and so one will have labored for money, but not for anything one needs or would have exchanged the labor (or done the labor in the first place). 

Let's return to the original lunchroom group now. Suppose that the system becomes complicated in such a way that the group, before they are at full capacity, decides they need someone to keep track of everything and to keep it operating smoothly in some way, facilitating the trading, perhaps providing refrigerated storage or ovens to heat food, etc. So they hire someone to do that, and reward that person with lunch. Let us say this system is at then at full capacity. Suppose there are eleven members in the fully operating system. That means ten of them actually produce food products and one of them does not. The administrator, who is not producing food, is not trading with each of the other members in the same way they are trading with each other. They each give him some of their food, but he gives each of them nothing in return individually. What he is providing is labor that makes their individual trading with each other possible. It may look like his role is dispensable, but it is not. Or it may be that his role is dispensable for some of the participants, but not for the rest or for the group as a whole. 

One question that now might be raised is whether the administrator is a governor (i.e., a government public servant), or is a manager (i.e., a private businessman in trade with the others, providing them with a service). If he is a governor, then what he is paid for his services would be essentially tax revenue, whereas if he is a manager, his lunch is private, business income. It seems to me that at this point there is nothing, which would not be purely arbitrary, that can distinguish whether he is a governor or a manager. He could have a term of office, but that would not be any different from a template kind of contract. He could have powers over the group, though they derive in some way from the group that has hired or elected him, and his performance must somehow please enough of them that they all retain his service. If not he could be fired or non-renewed at the end of his contract if he is a manager, or recalled or voted out of office at the end of his term if he is a governor. Both managers and governors have powers bestowed upon them by those they serve. I will say more later about the lack, and simply apparent, differences between government and private business.

If the enterprise grew and grew, perhaps adding entertainment, homework assistance, tutoring, carpooling to and from school, etc. at some point other administrators might be appointed to do various rolls, including some who would make rules by which the enterprise needed to operate. Whether collectively they would be properly called a legislature or a board of directors, again seems arbitrary. The point is that they are somehow supposedly facilitating the enterprise, but are not part of making the products or providing the services that the enterprise trades among those interested in participating. In other words, once a system of division of labor and trade becomes very large and needs facilitators to help out the producers collectively, the designation of those facilitators as part of the government or part of corporate management seems somewhat arbitrary in terms of their actual role in the enterprise. Even if we call governments only those institutions which manage a "whole" society of some sort, instead of a small portion of it, there are clearly worldwide international business organizations that are bigger than some (local) governments, and which manage a more diverse population. In a multinational corporation that has many different enterprises under its purview -- manufacturing anything from food to automobile tires -- there may even be more in common among people governed by a local government than the people managed by the large corporation. And just as people can choose not to be managed by a given company's executives -- by quitting the firm-- people can also choose not to be governed by a particular government -- by moving to another country, or in part by trading their citizenship for that of another country's.

But apart from what kind of system we call it and apart from whether it works on barter or money trade, the main aspect of our school lunch, or any collective trading enterprise, is the collective work and the trading of that work. Money and financial vehicles may facilitate that work and trade, but they are not the only way to facilitate them; and it is the labor and its products (and some psychological aspects of labor -- e.g., whether it is voluntary or involuntary, coerced or pressured, etc.) which are ultimately what is important in an enterprise. And money sometimes masks what is actually happening with labor and its products.

There are a number of ways that trade in a particular good or service can diminish. Producers might end or diminish their production. Producers might die, retire, or go into other work. Raw materials or means of production or distribution might become unavailable or unaffordable. Goods or money might be saved, either by hoarding or any other reduction in consumption. For example, needs may be eliminated and thus the goods and services which would have met them will not be necessary and will not be traded for, and diminished confidence in having sufficient money in the future may cause people to refrain from purchasing lower priority items. A decline in market values can be one cause of diminished confidence in the future. Prices can change in a way that makes some previously affordable goods become unaffordable. Priorities can change in ways that affect price or psychological demand. Fear of future availability might prompt hoarding. Interest rates, investment, or other financial vehicles and instruments can become unworkable, unpopular, or undesirable.

The way in which trade is reduced is significant for the well-being of the members of society. When trade is diminished in a way that creates a new equilibrium among equal or higher priorities and needs, there is no reduction in the quality of life. But if a new equilibrium must be established among lower priorities and needs, or if an equilibrium cannot be established at all, where each contributes and each receives a satisfactory portion of the total contributions, then the reduction in trade also reduces the quality of life among at least some members of the community. If a trade reduction simply leads to increased desirable leisure fairly distributed, that can be a good thing. When it leads to forced idleness or unemployment that takes one out of the trading loop against one's will, that is a bad thing.

The problem, when there is one, with any change in an economy or trading loop is that different members of any given loop or trading equilibrium are affected differently and cannot as easily re-establish themselves in a new equilibrium. Inflation, for example, hurts those on fixed incomes. New inventions put some people out of work who must take time to retrain for new work. Some work takes longer to learn than others. Some work cannot easily be divided to make increased leisure available to more people who need jobs. A dramatic rise in the price of some necessity, such as gasoline and heating oil might reduce sufficient people's disposable income that it causes temporary or permanent loss of jobs among those who produce conveniences or luxuries. Eventual market saturation of a product that caused an economic boom when it was new (such as computers and the Internet), can bring a serious economic slowdown. Taxes and trade both get complex quickly because there are multiple purposes, multiple results, and convoluted eco-system relationships in which a change in one factor has multiple, often automatic ripple effects that are impossible to isolate, without disturbing something else in an equally problematic way, and difficult even to trace. 

Some financial mechanisms cannot adjust appropriately to change very easily, quickly, or automatically. For example, property taxes based on market values may not be fair to some property owners when market values change in ways that are unfair or unrealistic (see chapter 30). Consumer "confidence" and thus spending habits may change drastically with changes in various market values, as well as for predicted revenue decreases due to other causes. Or tax revenues for necessary public services may decrease just because trade in private goods diminishes, whether for a good cause or a problematic one. 

Suppose, for example, using the automobile case from the first and sixth chapters, that people need to spend less on cars, or that they need less health care because everyone is healthier due to better nutrition, new vaccines, and better preventive information. That diminishes the tax revenues based on trade. And while it might provide more leisure or more purchasing power of other things for those who would have previously needed to purchase cars or health care, it can wreak havoc with those services paid for by tax revenues collected from the sale of automobiles and medical care. It can also wreak havoc on the employability of those who formerly supplied cars, car maintenance, or health care. As money is alternatively concentrated and dispersed it affects different markets differently, with concentrated money able to purchase bigger projects and with dispersed money able to attract less expensive, more individualized goods and services. Some financial vehicles concentrate and disperse money -- e.g., banks that create loans for individual mortgages or auto loans from customer deposits, and taxes that pay social security or welfare recipients, disaster victims, etc. 

In some cases, individuals and institutions either trying to enter a trading system or displaced somehow in one that was previously functioning well for them, may be able to find a niche in the (new) trading system themselves. But, in some cases it may take some kind of help or coordination from those individuals and organizations, whether private or public, who can see and affect the "bigger picture," seeing where jobs and needs already exist, are reasonably anticipated, or could be created, and providing or coordinating training for the unemployed and the underemployed.

Now, it seems to me that when (reasonably or at least decently) efficient and effective governments experience serious tax revenue reductions, the appropriate response should be dependent on the specific causes and results of the revenue reduction. 

If trade diminishes because less work is necessary, that creates a very different set of conditions from when trade diminishes because some individual or group is essentially hoarding money -- by selling without commensurate buying or investing, whether as individuals or as in some foreign trade imbalances. In the former case -- where less work is necessary -- tax and other government policies need to reflect fewer needs, and in the case of hoarding, tax and other government policies need to be aimed at getting money and trade "flowing" or circulating again. In the former case, decreased tax revenues might reflect a decrease in necessary services -- as when "peace breaks out" and defense (spending) needs are less. In the latter case, taxes might need to be levied in some way on hoardings/savings past a certain point. Just raising or lowering taxes on the basis of overall government revenue needs (or perceived needs) is too indiscriminate. Taxes need to be a fair and reasonable reflection of the work, trade, needs, abilities, benefits, and burdens in or available to the economy. They should not just be a matter of numerical calculation -- and certainly not numerical calculations based only on the government's isolated income-expenditure needs apart from what the entire economy (i.e., system of division of labor and trade) is doing or trying to do, and how well it is doing it. 

If, to begin with for example, it is the case that trade decreases because some consumers have fewer unmet needs and restricted or curtailed desires for goods or services and are able to reduce their spending voluntarily or quasi-voluntarily (as in the case of cutting back on travel because of concerns about terrorism or cutting back on other purchases because of loss of "consumer confidence"), then, assuming the same income, those specific people have a greater portion of their income that is typically considered disposable, but for which there is no real disposition to spend. Theoretically, if there were some way of tapping into the portion of that money which would have gone to taxes had it been spent, it would replace the lost tax revenues. If we were just to look at, say, lost sales tax revenue (based on an 8% sales tax), then theoretically the government could collect 8% of the money saved by people from not spending it on taxable goods. But we still now have to worry about the people out of work who are unable to find work because consumer needs and desires are simply lower than they were previously. It could be that these people will find work in a new industry that attracts disposable income. In that case, government should proportionally reduce or end its boosted taxes so that the people taxed are able to purchase the goods or services from the new industry. 

But it may be, though, that the government will need to stimulate or secure job re-training and increased employment opportunities. This might be done with tax revenues or it might be done by private business with some government incentive. For example, it could be that seeking a reduction in the standard work week would suffice to have companies employ more people, working shifts, to take up the unemployment slack and smooth out the work/leisure proportions for everyone, so that more people each work less time instead of some people working long while others are unemployed. After all, if we started from the opposite situation -- one where everyone lived together on a paradise island with no collaborative needs, and a need appeared for some kind of work to be done that would benefit everyone, the first inclination would probably be to share the labor fairly among all people, so that no one had to work for very long. Working in reverse, as mass production, vaccines, market saturations, and other sorts of need-reducing or labor-reducing measures come into place in an economy working full time, theoretically there should be more leisure evenly divided among people.

If it is the case that whatever causes the reduction in trade also causes a reduction in the needs and purchases of the government, then a tax reduction would be in order, along with some mechanism to fairly even out the work/leisure hours among people.

Or it could be that as consumer needs are met, more labor could be employed to provide necessary public services. The revenue for that could, again, come out of greater disposable income people have as they reduce consumption, for greater disposable income is not really disposable if there is nothing to purchase with it. Greater amounts of money appear to make us wealthier, but wealth is not a matter of money, but of the ability to meet more needs and desires. As the amount of unmet needs and unfulfilled desires decreases, less money is necessary, and additional money has little value.

But it is also the case that greater leisure, coupled with volunteerism, can possibly reduce the need for government services or for tax revenue. For example, mentoring programs can reduce the need for school programs, since mentors can often teach children individually or in small groups more than teachers in classrooms with inflexible programs will. Government agencies might get more for the tax money by initiating and fostering mentoring programs than by pouring more money into schools under some circumstances.

What is desired is that benefits and burdens of work are distributed in efficient, effective, reasonable and fair ways. Free markets do that to some extent, but, as far as I can see, the main differences between markets and public or government institutions are that (1) markets tend to allow more competition in some cases and less centralized control -- though that is not always true, and is certainly not always necessary; large companies can be fossilized by bureaucracy and governments do not often need as much central control as they too often have; and (2) market purchases seem to be voluntary in ways that government services are not -- in that in the market you do not have to buy what you do not want or need, but taxes are in some cases coerced and do not feel voluntary or worthwhile. So there is more a feeling or perception of freedom with market transactions and purchases than with payment of taxes. And while people complain of waste in government, they seldom think that prices of goods and services in the market include fat due to waste, extravagance, or unreasonable, excess profit. Yet, that is perhaps as often the case as it is in government. Businesses do not necessarily operate as "lean" as competition is alleged to compel. 

But in cases where desires are manufactured by psychological manipulation, there is not real freedom even though there is the perception of freedom. More importantly, not all purchases are happily paid for. Many necessities are resented, many times prices are considered too high but a consumer feels "over a barrel" to pay it. Interest often feels like it is somehow unnecessary or unfair. And credit card bills, even when paid each month in full, often are resented because one has already tired of the product one purchased with the card. General Motors used to run an ad campaign that said your car was your freedom, but many people feel more like a car is an albatross around their neck. Instead of feeling good about buying a new car, they feel they have just sunk themselves further in debt with car payments, increased insurance payments, car tags, maintenance, etc. 

Similarly with regard to income. To some extent, as trade equilibria are constantly adjusting, salaries are not totally unrelated to taxes. Employers will often have to pay more to workers who have higher taxes because their financial needs will be greater. Cost of living (including taxes) are taken into account in salary considerations. But that tends to be ignored later. So someone successfully negotiates for a higher salary that accounts for higher taxes, and then resents having to pay the taxes because he thinks he would have that higher salary anyway. But he might not, and probably wouldn't. 

Moreover, the employer has restraints on salaries in the form of his own business costs apart from salaries. So if there is some overhead for the business that must be paid out of gross income, that, in a sense, comes out of the employees' potential salaries before their salaries are computed, rather than after they are computed like taxes do. Similarly with sales tax and the cost of items. Overhead costs are not tacked on at the register like sales tax is, so they are not usually as visible or as maddening. But if workers received a paycheck that simply dispersed a company's gross income apart from salaries and then had "deductions" for company overhead and expenses, they would probably find those deductions as upsetting and frustrating as tax deductions. They would feel they were being asked to pay for goods and services the business uses, and they might start to find fault with amenities they now think are really nice. Or, if purchased items had a price tag that reflected only the cost of the materials involved, and then other overhead costs were added to the price at the register, people would be even more upset than they are about sales tax, just as they often are upset when the labor for automobile repair is more than the costs of the parts and they see the two fees itemized separately instead of just receiving one aggregate bill.. 

But whatever the reason, psychologically the resentment people might have toward higher prices is not the same resentment that some people harbor toward taxes when they feel the tax money is spent on services of which they disapprove. People in countries where taxes are spent the way they want them often feel better about higher taxes than Americans feel about lower ones. 

But I would contend there is not as much real or conceptual difference between paying taxes and buying things as is often portrayed or thought. The difference seems to be more a matter of perception and psychology than anything else. On "Car Talk" Tommy and Ray Magliozzi talk about unnecessary fees in the private sector when they advise you to stay away from auto mechanics who own large boats because they say you will be charged for his boat payment that will be hidden in his parts and labor fees. So that while some people might think a mechanic who charges more than another, or who "finds" more wrong with your car, is the better mechanic, Tommy and Ray point out he might just be the mechanic with the higher material appetite to satisfy. But apart from Tommy and Ray talking about auto mechanics, most people seem to resent having to pay a fraction of a cent to cover the tax deductions for a businessman's three-martini lunch far more than they resent paying the additional three or four cents embedded in the price of some necessity that covers the company's expenses for the three-martini lunch in the first place. To me it is a distinction without a difference.

And when economists talk about how too much tax can kill incentive to create or expand a business, so does too much overhead or too high potential start-up costs. Obviously, in a high risk venture, huge start-up costs might be more chilling than in a low risk venture. But there are other kinds of things to take into account in the notion of overhead as well. Sometimes people just don't like paying for certain services even if it benefits them. One year, I took the baseball team/individual pictures for a local youth league. There were some 50 teams. I took the photos on one weekend all day Saturday and half of Sunday, shooting the teams and the individuals. I guaranteed everyone's satisfaction with the individual pictures or I would re-shoot them. If it rained on the days scheduled we would reschedule for a different weekend instead of shooting them indoors as other photographers do who take this sort of picture. As far as I know, all the parents were happy with their pictures and thought them much better than those they were used to getting. However, the league administrators were not happy because I had charged a dollar or two more per package than other photographers and they felt they could not mark up the pictures as much as they had in the past. Why they accepted my bid then, is a mystery to me. It turns out they quote the parents a higher price than the photographer charges them, and they keep the difference for the league without telling either the parents or the photographer. I was unhappy to find out they did that because I had given them a bid based on what I thought was a good price for the parents. I might not have participated if I had known they were going to make me look like I was charging more than I was. But at any rate, they felt it was too high an overhead for them for what they wanted to do and what they wanted to make. They presumed the parents would not want to pay more, so they could make their usual profit. I don't know whether the parents would have happily paid more or not. I also suspect that parents would have been unhappy to find out the league took their own cut (similar to a tax) out of the picture fees.

In something somewhat similar to that, I turn down people offering to broker my services to a community of which they are a part because they claim they are offering a free service to their clients, but in reality they are giving advice to their clients based on who pays them the most to recommend them. I consider that unsavory advising or representation. And I also would have to raise my prices to take into account their cut if I were going to employ them to do this. I also turned it down because they said people would hire me on their advice, and that is not the way I want to get customers. I want people to hire me because they like my work, not because I paid someone they trust to tout me. But the point of these stories is that overhead costs are hidden for good psychological (though bad ethical) reason because otherwise they would cause the same sort of resentments that taxes do.

Taxes are just one form of expense, and any form of expense can be too much to make starting, expanding, or continuing a business worthwhile. It is just that taxes are not specific to some particular business expense. But purchase of a truck to deliver goods is not that much different than payment of taxes to construct and maintain the roads the truck uses. When trucking companies balk at road taxes, they might want to see whether they would prefer instead to build and maintain their own roads just because they could see that as a different kind of expense. I don't think it would make them feel better about the (size of the) expenditures. But as Galbraith has noticed, psychologically there is a big difference in people's minds between paying for private goods (e.g., cars or trucks) and paying for public goods (e.g., in this case, roads), and people seem willing to pay more for private goods than for public ones even though, the public goods may be as, or even more, necessary in order to make the private goods useful. Trucks without roads would be just parking lot adornments.

As in many other economic factors, if we look at the actual work being done in any economy -- the actual benefits and burdens, labors and rewards, and their distribution -- a different picture emerges about the nature, function, proper role, proper source, and proper amount of taxes than what appears from just looking at government balance sheets. And the contrasts, if any, between taxation and other sorts of overhead private costs do not appear to be as great as is often thought or portrayed.