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Quotations about Taxes
If you make any money, the Government shoves you in the creek once a year with it in your pockets, and all that don't get wet, you can keep. ~Will Rogers, 1914, as quoted in Bryan B. Sterling, The Best of Will Rogers, 1979
America is a land of taxation that was founded to avoid taxation. ~Laurence J. Peter, Peter's Quotations: Ideas For Our Time, 1977
The United States has a system of taxation by confession. That a people so numerous, scattered and individualistic annually assesses itself with a tax liability, often in highly burdensome amounts, is a reassuring sign of the stability and vitality of our system of self-government. ~Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson, United States v. Kahriger, 1953
Why does a slight tax increase cost you $200 and a substantial tax cut save you 30¢? ~Peg Bracken, "A Dollar Is a Sometime Thing," I Didn't Come Here To Argue
Taxes are paid in the sweat of every man who labors. ~Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1932
The Income Tax has made more Liars out of the American people than Golf has. Even when you make one out on the level, you don't know when it's through if you are a Crook or a Martyr. ~Will Rogers
RIGHTFUL TAXATION IS THE PRICE OF SOCIAL ORDER. In other words, it is that portion of the citizen's property which he yields up to the government in order to provide for the protection of all the rest. It is not to be wantonly levied on the citizen, nor levied at all except in return for benefits conferred. The individual pays... then he has the broad mantle of the law spread over him, to protect him when he sleeps and defend him when he awakes. ~Edward Archbold, 1848
POTHINUS. [bitterly] Is it possible that Cæsar, the conqueror of the world, has time to occupy himself with such a trifle as our taxes?
CÆSAR. My friend: taxes are the chief business of a conqueror of the world.
~Bernard Shaw, Cæsar and Cleopatra, 1899
Did you ever notice: when you put the two words "The" and "IRS" together, it spells "THEIRS"? ~Soupy Sales
Intaxication: euphoria at getting a refund from the IRS, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with. ~Greg Oetjen, Washington Post contest, 1998
But everybody violates the tax laws. The whole point of the U.S. tax system is to be so complicated that no normal human can conform to it, or even think about it for more than 10 seconds without bleeding from the forehead. This system enables the Internal Revenue Service to select random taxpayers for audit with 100 percent confidence that they will be guilty of something, even if they live in isolated wilderness areas and measure their annual income in squirrel meat. ~Dave Barry, 1997, davebarry.com
"It was as true," said Mr. Barkis, "as turnips is. It was as true," said Mr. Barkis, nodding his nightcap, which was his only means of emphasis, "as taxes is. And nothing 's truer than them." ~Charles Dickens, David Copperfield, 1849
A government bond is a financial device to give you back some of the money you paid in taxes. ~20,000 Quips & Quotes, Evan Esar, 1968
A tariff is like a tax, but it's a little bit bitchy. ~Saturday Night Live, "Weekend Update," 2019, written by Che, Jost, Sublette, et al. [S45, E9,
Income tax returns are the most imaginative fiction being written today. ~Herman Wouk
I shall not make use of slang or vulgarity upon any occasion or under any circumstances, and shall never use profanity except in discussing house rent and taxes. Indeed, upon second thought, I will not even use it then, for it is unchristian, inelegant, and degrading — though to speak truly I do not see how house rent and taxes are going to be discussed worth a cent without it. ~Mark Twain, 1869
Capital punishment — the income tax. ~Life, "Life Lines," 1921
You are going to need sales taxes, both Federal and State, income tax, and a lot of other kinds. It's a great country but you can't live in it for nothing. ~Will Rogers (1879–1935)
It's income-tax time again, Americans: time to gather up those receipts, get out those tax forms, sharpen up that pencil and stab yourself in the aorta. ~Dave Barry, 1996, davebarry.com
The average taxpayer believes in only one kind of government handout — the kind that takes the government's hand out of his pocket. ~20,000 Quips & Quotes, Evan Esar, 1968
Taxation is the price which we pay for civilization, for our social, civil and political institutions, for the security of life and property, and without which, we must resort to the law of force... [T]axes are not to be considered a grievance, but as our fair contribution for the common good... ~John N. Pomeroy, Waitstill R. Ranney, and Timothy P. Redfield, Report of the Committee Appointed by the Governor to Take into Consideration the Financial Affairs of the State of Vermont, 1851
The village had its one poor street, with its poor brewery, poor tannery, poor tavern, poor stable-yard for relays of post-horses, poor fountain, all usual poor appointments. It had its poor people too. All its people were poor, and many of them were sitting at their doors, shredding spare onions and the like for supper, while many were at the fountain, washing leaves, and grasses, and any such small yieldings of the earth that could be eaten. Expressive signs of what made them poor, were not wanting; the tax for the state, the tax for the church, the tax for the lord, tax local and tax general, were to be paid here and to be paid there, according to solemn inscription in the little village, until the wonder was, that there was any village left unswallowed. ~Charles Dickens (1812–1870)
Back then, government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it. ~Ronald Reagan, 1986
Tea, coffee, spirits, laces, silks, and spice,
And sundry drugs that bear a noble price,
Are bought for little, but, ere sold, the things
Are deeply charged for duty of the king's.
~George Crabbe (1754–1832), "Barnaby, the Shopman"
A person doesn't know how much he has to be thankful for until he has to pay taxes on it. ~"Gem of the Day," Ann Landers, 1995 April 27th
Tax-assessors frequently overlook valuables.
Today they noted my jade.
But my memory of you escaped them.
~Anne Knish (Arthur Davison Ficke), "Opus 118," Spectra: A Book of Poetic Experiments, 1916 [farce
Collecting more taxes than is absolutely necessary is legalized robbery. ~Calvin Coolidge
The crime of taxation is not in the taking of it, it's in the way that it's spent. ~Will Rogers (1879–1935)
U.S. Internal Revenue Service: an agency modeled after the revenue raising concepts of the 19th century economist, Jesse James. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com
You don't even pay taxes — they take tax! You get your check — money's gone! That ain't a payment, that's a jack. ~Chris Rock, Bigger & Blacker, 1999, HBO
Indoors or out, no one relaxes
In March, that month of wind and taxes,
The wind will presently disappear,
The taxes last us all the year.
~Ogden Nash, "Thar She Blows," 1949
[Tax Day used to be in March, not April.
Nothing makes filling out a 1040 easier than having enough proof —
If Congress were to pass a "flat" tax, you'd simply pay a fixed percentage of your income, and you wouldn't have to fill out any complicated forms, and there would be no loopholes for politically connected groups, and normal people would actually understand the tax laws, and giant talking broccoli stalks would come around and mow your lawn for free, because Congress is NOT going to pass a flat tax. ~Dave Barry, 1996, davebarry.com
Taxation is the price which civilized communities pay for the opportunity of remaining civilized. ~Albert Bushnell Hart, Actual Government, 1903
Earning money would be a pleasure — if it wasn't so taxing. ~20,000 Quips & Quotes, Evan Esar, 1968
But, sir, we are told that this is an odious and unpopular tax. I never knew a tax that was not odious and unpopular with the people who paid it... Sir, if you would levy only taxes which in the opinion of everybody, or even of a majority, are not unequal and unjust, you would have such a tax law as I have never yet seen. ~John Sherman, 1871
"Count that day won," he sings, "when, turning on its axis, this earth imposes no additional taxes." ~Franklin P. Adams
Abracadabra, thus we learn
The more you create, the less you earn.
The less you earn, the more you're given,
The less you lead, the more you're driven,
The more destroyed, the more they feed,
The more you pay, the more they need,
The more you earn, the less you keep,
And now I lay me down to sleep.
I pray the Lord my soul to take
If the tax-collector hasn't got it before I wake.
~Ogden Nash (1902–1971)
Any tax is a discouragement and therefore a regulation so far as it goes... ~Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Pacific American Fisheries v. Territory of Alaska, 1925
When it comes to reasoning with the IRS, there's no way, shape or form — and you wouldn't understand the form, anyway. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com
Of course, the truth is that the congresspersons are too busy raising campaign money to read the laws they pass. The laws are written by staff tax nerds who can put pretty much any wording they want in there. I bet that if you actually read the entire vastness of the U.S. Tax Code, you'd find at least one sex scene ("'Yes yes YES!' moaned Vanessa as Lance, his taut body, moist with moisture, again and again depreciated her adjusted gross rate of annualized fiscal debenture"). ~Dave Barry, 1997, davebarry.com
Well, the good old days with most of us was when we didn't earn enough to pay an income tax. ~Will Rogers, 1935
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published 2000 Mar 27
revised 2021 Mar 3
last saved 2024 Apr 15
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