The social interest requires that taxes be both elastic and productive, so that the needs of the government shall be amply provided for. The harmonizing of these needs in the laws of taxation requires a high degree of wisdom, of foresight, and of integrity in the legislator and in the citizen. No hard-and fast rule for the apportioning of taxes can be laid down. The decision must be made in each generation by the public opinion as to what is most expedient for the general welfare.
§ 13. Principles of administration. Whatever forms of taxes are adopted, whether on property or income, whether at proportional or at progressive rates, their justice and ex pediency depend largely on their administration. Principle and practice in this, as in most affairs, may go far apart. The administration of taxation should be economical, certain, and uniform. (1) Some laws are more easily and economically executed than others. The time of collection should be as con venient as possible for the citizen, and the mode of payment should be the most simple. (2) The utmost certainty is desir able as to the time, method of payment, and amount. Taxation that, in its principle, is variable, shifting, or dependent on personal whim and favoritism, is despotism. (3) But the greatest evils, in practice, result from failures in uniformity as between individuals. The assessment of taxes has to be intrusted to men with fallible judgment, imperfect lmowl edge, and selfish interests. The assessor is as near a despot as any agent of popular government to-day. Not infrequently men of proved incapacity in every private business they have attempted are, for partizan or cor rupt reasons, selected as assessors, and are given the power of passing judgment on the value of millions of dollars' worth of property. Under the circumstances, evils are to be expected, and they occur. The small owner often is crushed under the unequal assessment, while the large owner comes off lightly. Political friends are favored, political foes are made to suffer. Even the most honest and capable of assessors find in the imperfections of the tax laws * an insuperable obstacle to even-handed justice.
the tax ; the final location of the burden is called the incidence of the tax. The lawmaker cannot tell exactly where the weight will fall. The principles of value give some guidance in the 'Particularly the difficulties noted in the next chapter, §§ 2-5.
inquiry, but the workings of the principle are difficult to follow.
Consider a situation where certain taxes have been for some time levied. They have become a part of the general adjust ment of prices. If paid by any one in business they may be looked upon as a deduction from the gross proceeds or product of the business, prior to cost, or as a part of In either case, every one choosing that business does so in the light of this fact. Unless the business promises to yield as good in comes (wages, profits) as other lines, the number engaging in it, and the output, must diminish, and thus the price of the product rises, or the cost of the factor falls, or both in some proportion. The tax on any durative agent or on any es tablished business thus becomes incorporated after a time in its price and in the prices of the products, and any purchaser pays a price based on the net income remaining to the owner of the wealth after the tax is paid. Viewed in this way, taxes are seen to be borne to some extent by every one, by those who do not as well as by those who do actually meet the tax-col lector face to face. The citizen with no taxable property is affected, far more than he realizes, by extravagance of gov ernment and by inequities in taxation, for the effects of most taxes are diffused so that every self-sustaining member of the community has some share in them.