Editing Tax (section)

===Support===
{{Main|Social contract}}
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| quote = Every tax, however, is, to the person who pays it, a badge, not of slavery, but of [[liberty]].
– [[Adam Smith]] (1776), ''[[Wealth of Nations]]''<ref name="Smith">{{Cite web|last=Smith |first=Adam |year=1776 |url=http://www2.hn.psu.edu/faculty/jmanis/adam-smith/Wealth-Nations.pdf |title=An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of The Wealth of Nations |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131020042323/http://www2.hn.psu.edu/faculty/jmanis/adam-smith/Wealth-Nations.pdf |archive-date=20 October 2013 |url-status=dead |website=Penn State Electronic Classics Series |publication-date=2005 |page=704}}</ref>
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According to most [[Political philosophy|political philosophies]]<!-- whose? -->, taxes are justified as they fund activities that are necessary and beneficial to [[society]]. Additionally, [[progressive tax]]ation can be used to reduce [[economic inequality]] in a society. According to this view, taxation in modern nation-states benefit the majority of the population and [[Social change|social development]].<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20040701064132/http://www.unescap.org/esid/psis/publications/theme2002/chap5.asp Population and Social Integration Section (PSIS)], United Nations Social and Economic Commission for Asia and the Pacific</ref> A common presentation of this view, paraphrasing various statements by [[Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.]] is "Taxes are the price of civilization".<ref>{{cite book|author=Eugene C. Gerhart|title=Quote it Completely!: World Reference Guide to More Than 5,500 Memorable Quotations from Law and Literature|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kjwVASsTUm0C&pg=PA1045|year=1998|publisher=W.S. Hein|isbn=978-1-57588-400-4|page=1045}}</ref>

It can also be argued that in a [[democracy]], because the government is the party performing the act of imposing taxes, society as a whole decides how the tax system should be organized.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Logue |first1=Danielle |year=2009 |title=Moving policy forward: 'brain drain' as a wicked problem |journal=Globalisation, Societies & Education |volume=7 |issue=1 |pages=41–50 |doi=10.1080/14767720802677366|s2cid=145794119 }}</ref> The [[American Revolution]]'s "[[No taxation without representation]]" slogan implied this view. For traditional [[conservatives]], the payment of taxation is justified as part of the general obligations of citizens to obey the law and support established institutions. The conservative position is encapsulated in perhaps the most famous [[adage]] of [[public finance]], "An old tax is a good tax".<ref name="Tax History Project">{{Cite web|url=http://www.taxhistory.org/thp/readings.nsf/ArtWeb/44DC64199FBB0ED885256DFE005981FE?OpenDocument|title=Tax History Project – The Depression and Reform – FDR's Search for Tax Revision in N.Y.|website=taxhistory.org}}</ref> Conservatives advocate the "fundamental conservative premise that no one should be excused from paying for government, lest they come to believe that government is costless to them with the certain consequence that they will demand more government 'services'."<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.heritage.org/Research/Taxes/HL349.cfm |title=Do Conservatives Have a Conservative Tax Agenda? |publisher=Heritage.org |access-date=22 January 2013 |url-status=unfit |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090522061204/http://www.heritage.org/Research/Taxes/HL349.cfm |archive-date=22 May 2009 }}</ref> [[Social democrats]] generally favor higher levels of taxation to fund public provision of a wide range of services such as universal [[health care]] and education, as well as the provision of a range of [[Welfare state|welfare benefits]].<ref>Ruiz del Portal, X. 2009. "A general principal–agent setting with non-differentiable mechanisms: Some examples." Mathematical Social Sciences 57, no. 2: 262–78. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost.</ref> As argued by [[Anthony Crosland]] and others, the capacity to tax income from capital is a central element of the social democratic case for a [[mixed economy]] as against [[Marxist]] arguments for comprehensive public ownership of capital.<ref>{{cite book|last=Chaturvedi|first=Skand|title=Financial Management: Entailing Planning for the Future|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AcykUkuRD2IC&pg=PA77|year=2009|publisher=Global India Publications|isbn=978-93-80228-56-3|page=77}}</ref> American [[Libertarianism in the United States|libertarians]] recommend a minimal level of taxation in order to maximize the protection of [[liberty]].<ref>{{Cite web |date=2019-11-15 |title=Yes, Taxation Is Theft {{!}} Mises Institute |url=https://mises.org/mises-wire/yes-taxation-theft |access-date=2025-01-05 |website=mises.org |language=en}}</ref>

Compulsory taxation of individuals, such as [[income tax]], is often justified on grounds including territorial [[sovereignty]], and the [[social contract]]. Defenders of business taxation argue that it is an efficient method of taxing income that ultimately flows to individuals, or that separate taxation of [[business]] is justified on the grounds that commercial activity necessarily involves the use of publicly established and maintained economic infrastructure, and that businesses are in effect charged for this use.<ref>Van Der Graaf, Rieke, and Johannes J. M. Van Delden. 2009. ''Clarifying appeals to dignity in medical ethics from a historical perspective''. Bioethics 23, no. 3: 151–60. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost.</ref> [[Georgist]] economists argue that all of the [[economic rent]] collected from natural resources (land, mineral extraction, fishing quotas, etc.) is unearned income, and belongs to the community rather than any individual. They advocate a high tax (the "Single Tax") on land and other natural resources to return this unearned income to the state, but no other taxes.