Our suggested Genre-ista blog
theme this month is Death and/or Taxes. In doing some research into the history
of taxation (because the history of death is too weird even for me), I came
across the ancient practice of Tax Farming. The conversation with my flummoxed
self when I read the words
Tax Farming
went something like this:
ME: Shazam! You can farm taxes? Who
knew?
MYSELF: It’s probably illegal,
like growing opium or babies.
ME: I wonder if they’re farming tax payments or tax rates.
MYSELF: Either way, how do the
farmers find pickers they can trust? And how do they turn a profit?
ME: I wonder if they farm taxes in
Farmville. If I played Farmville, I’d probably know all about tax farming. I
knew I’d regret blocking all those annoying Facebook posts.
MYSELF: Naw, if players farmed
taxes in Farmville, it would have made the news. Every crazy, useless thing
people do makes the news.
ME: What do you mean?
MYSELF: Don’t get me started!
ME: (Trying to focus on writing this post) You don’t think it means
Taxes, on Farming – do you?
 |
| TAX FARMING? |
MYSELF: Click on the link and
find out.
ME: (Blinking) Not even close.
MYSELF: (Reading from http://www.taxworld.org/History/tax_farming.htm
) “Tax
farming is the principle of
assigning the responsibility for tax revenue collection to private citizens or
groups. Tax farming occurred in Egypt, Rome, Great Britain, and Greece. The
principle was…”
ME: (Shuddering) Geez Louise,
those Roman publicani were more like government
Mafia-type enforcers than IRS Agents. And the Greek Ptolemies messed up the
Egyptian system by instituting tax farming. I hereby renounce my interest in
this evil practice!
 |
| DOWN WITH THE PUBLICANI! |
MYSELF: What are those other
historical tax terms? Danegeld? Scuttage? Aids?
ME: (Yawning) Fodder for another post. Who chose these Genre-ista
themes, anyway?
MYSELF: We did. With Judith.
Me: Well, it’s a good thing the
other Genre-istas wrote such interesting posts, because I got nothin’.
