What Are the Pros and Cons of a Flat Tax?

Tithes are religious taxes levied on residents by the European Christian Church. In the 6th century AD, the church began to levy this tax on Christian believers, using 1/10 of the "farm" claims of agricultural and pastoral products in the Bible. In 779 AD King Charles the Great provided that tithe payment was an obligation of every resident of the Frankish kingdom. In the middle of the 10th century, Western European countries followed suit. According to the nature of the product, the levy is divided into big tithe (grain), small tithe (vegetables, fruits), blood tithe (livestock) and so on. The amount of tax often exceeds 1/10 of the taxpayer's income, and the burden mainly lies on farmers. During the Reformation and the German Peasant War, the abolition of tithes was one of the basic requirements of farmers. Most Western European countries did not abolish it until the 18th-19th century. It was levied in Britain until 1936. ^[1]

Tithes

Tithes main arguments

Tithes are not long-term and fixed taxes, and their value will increase proportionally with the difficulty of increasing grain production.

Derivation of tithes

Perhaps the above argument is too abstract, and we can use examples to illustrate:

If the price of the grain caused by the difficulty of production is four pounds, the tax is eight shillings; if it increases the price to five pounds, the tax is ten shillings; when it increases to six pounds the tax is twelve shillings. Not only will the value increase, but the quantity will also increase. For example, when only the first-class land is cultivated, the tax is only collected from one hundred and eighty quarts; when the second-grade land is cultivated, it will be from three hundred and fifty (one hundred and seventy) Quart is taken in class; when cultivating third-class land, it will be taken from 510 (180 plus 170 and 160). When the product increases from one million quarts to two million quarts, not only will the tax amount increase from 100,000 quarts to 200,000 quarts, but also the labor required to produce the second one million quarts will increase. The relative value of agricultural products will also increase, so that although the amount of 200,000 quarts is only twice that of 100,000 quarts of sodium previously delivered, its value will be three times that of the previous.

If the church is levied an equal amount of value in any other way, the amount of tax, like tithes, increases correspondingly to the difficulty of farming, and its impact will be the same. Therefore, it would be a mistake to think that tithes are more obstacles to farming than the equivalent taxes levied by other means due to the imposition of taxes on land. In both cases, the church often obtains a larger share of the net product of the country's land and labor. In a progressive society, the ratio of net land products to total products is always getting smaller; but in both progressive and stagnant countries, all taxes are ultimately paid from net products. Therefore, taxes that increase with total income and fall on net income must be extremely heavy and unaffordable. Tithes are one-tenth of the total land product, not one-tenth of the net product; so when society increases wealth, tithe s share of the total product remains the same, but The share must inevitably increase.