From: Chris Townsend <townsend@smokin.fly.net>
Date: Sat, 27 Jan 1996 12:56:13 +0800
To: Alan Horowitz <alanh@infi.net>
Subject: [MORE IRRELEVANCE] Re: "Gentlemen do not read each other's mail"
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SV4.3.91.960126211149.24886C-100000@larry.infi.net>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.3.91.960126222944.12401B-100000@smokin.fly.net>
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Gawd, I hoped this would die but I just have to get a dog in on
this now....please excuse

On Fri, 26 Jan 1996, Alan Horowitz wrote:

> 
> > In fact, before FDR, wage income was taxed; however, it was one large 
> > check at the end of the yeraar (or the beginning of the next, really).
> 
>   I think this wrong. Read the definition of "income" before the WWII. 
> Wages were considered to be an equal exchange for labor services 
> rendered, not a "gain" (income).

Sixteenth Amnendment, ratified 1913.  I believe it was introduced
as the Simmons Tarriff?   1% on incomes over a few k, incremental
to 7% for something like 500k.  One big check.  And income meant 
the same thing it does now, you know, the numbers without the 
minus signs:

Funk & Wagnalls, 1913  (sorry, no URL)

1. The amount of money coming to a person or corporation within a 
specified time or regularly (when unqualified, annually), whether
as payment for services, interest, or profit from investment;
revenue.

Webster's 2nd International, 1954 (still no URL, not for the 2nd...)
4. That gain or recurrent benefit (usually measured in money) which
proceeds from labor, business, or property; commercial revenue or
receipts of any kind....

Now, granted, Funk & Wagnalls went to press before there was such
a thing as an income tax...so it's possible that for thirty two
years income meant something different, and reverted....

> 
> > The high cost of WW II made it a necessity for the gvm't to have more 
> > money at a particular moment, and not wait for year-end.
> 
>     Not so. Govt has been able to print fiat money at will since the Fed 
> Reserve was founded in 1913.

Actually, no, they could print fiat money whenever they damn well
pleased, same as ever.  Reserve notes were originally 60/40 third 
party (paper) loans to federal gold.  True, all of a sudden it 
was Uncle Sam's name on the notes, but it wasn't just ink.

>      Technically, the income tax is an excise, not a tax. They aren't the 
> same.
> 

!!!??  Aren't they?  Maybe a little bit of squares-rectangles business,
but, if so, all excises are taxes....

Websters:
ex'cise
2. An inland duty or impost levied upon the manufacture, sale, or 
consumption of commodities within the country. [...] In the United
States the usual <i>excise</i> is a tax on the inland manufacture, sale,
or consumption of commodities or for licenses to follow certain
occupations, and these taxes are usually called <i>internal
revenue taxes</i>

wheee,

cpt
townsend@fly.net