"The best way to understand this whole..." - Quote by Dave Barry
The best way to understand this whole issue is to look at what the government does: it takes money from some people, keeps a bunch of it, and gives the rest to other people.
More by Dave Barry
“Funny, isn't it? The airlines go to all that trouble to keep you from taking a gun on board, then they just hand you a dinner roll you could kill a musk ox with.”
“If it weren't for marriage, men and women would have to fight with total strangers.”
“If Peter was nine, and a new boy came to St. Norbert’s Home for Wayward Boys who said he was ten, why, then, Peter would declare himself eleven. Also, he could spit the farthest. That made him the undisputed leader.”
More on Government
“Politics, as the word is commonly understood, are nothing but corruptions, and consequently of no use to a good king or a good ministry; for which reason Courts are so overrun withpolitics.”
“Presidents are selected, not elected.”
“Now we are in the second term of the government of a united nation and the government has done very well. One thing they have done, one thing people could not be blind to, was the achievement this government has made in giving human beings dignity, which they did not enjoy before. They now have dignity.”
More on Taxes
“There are two distinct classes of men - those who pay taxes and those who receive and live upon taxes.”
“In those countries where income taxes are lower than in the United States, the ability to defer the payment of U.S. tax by retaining income in the subsidiary companies provides a tax advantage for companies operating through overseas subsidiaries that is not available to companies operating solely in the United States. Many American investors properly made use of this deferral in the conduct of their foreign investment.”
“There's only one kind of tax that would please everybody - one that nobody but the other guy has to pay.”