THE WEALTH OK NATIONS.

777

PART II.

Of Taxes.

The private revenue of individuals it lias been shewn in thefirst book of this Inquiry arises ultimately from three differentsources; rent, profit, and wages. Every tax must finally bepaid from some one or other of those three different sorts ofrevenue, or from all of them indiff erently. I shall endeavourto give the best account I can, first, of those taxes which, itis intended, should fall upon rent; secondly, of those which,it is intended, should fall upoif profit; thirdly, of those which,it is intended, should fall upon wages; and fourthly of thosewhich, it is intended, should fall indifferently upon all thosethree different sources of private revenue. The particularconsideration of each of these four different sorts of taxes willdivide the second part of the present chapter into four ar-ticles, three of which will require several other subdivisions.Many of those, taxes, it will appear from the following re-view, are not finally paid from the fund, or source of revenue,upon which it was intended they should fall.

Before 1 enter upon the examination of particular taxes,it is necessary to premise the four following maxims with re-gard to taxes in general.

I. The subjects of every state ought to contribute towardsthe support of the government, as nearly as possible, in pro-portion to their respective abilities ; that is, in proportion tothe revenue which they respectively enjoy under the protectionof the state. The expense of government to the individualsof a great nation is like the expense of management to thejoint tenants of a great estate, who are all obliged to contri-bute in proportion to their respective interests in the estate.In the observation or neglect of this maxim consists what iscalled the equality or inequality of taxation. Every tax, itmust be observed once for all, which falls finally upon oneonly of the three sorts of revenue above-mentioned, is neces-sarily unequal, in so far as it does not affect the other two.In the following examination of different taxes I shall seldomtake much further notice of this sort of inequality, but shall,in most cases, confine my observations to that inequalitywhich is occasioned by a particular tax falling unequallyu pon that particular sort of private revenue which is affectedby it.