April 12, 2006
Income Tax History
| Host: | Vic Eliason |
| Guest: | William Federer |
| Listen: | RealAudio | Windows Media | MP3 | Order Tape or CD |
William Federer is an historian, and author of the book, The Interesting History of Income Tax.
Our founders rebelled against King George because of various usurpations such as taxation without consent.
Fast forward to 1913 and we see Woodrow Wilson introducing the income tax. He felt this was necessary to replace tariff taxes on imports, a tax that he felt caused wars. His income tax was 1% on the top 1% wealthiest people.
In 1941 it was brought up to a 4% flat tax. Then in 1943 the government introduced paycheck withholding which was an emergency effort to fight Hitler. This was known as the pay-as-you-go tax.
With the Korean war the tax was raised to an 11% progressive tax.
These fascinating tax facts and others are discussed on this edition of Crosstalk.
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