There was a fantastic mises daily article about creeping taxes and tyranny in the Roman Empire. Available in audio too. mises.org/daily/3663
Here are some excerpts:
– The advice that the Emperor Septimius Severus gave to his two sons, Caracalla and Geta: “live in harmony; enrich the troops; ignore everyone else.”
– “nobody should have any money but I, so that I may bestow it upon the soldiers.”
– “. . . he doubled the inheritance taxes paid by Roman citizens. When this was not sufficient to meet his needs, he admitted almost every inhabitant of the empire to Roman citizenship. What had formerly been a privilege now became simply a means of expanding the tax base.”
– “One of the Christian fathers, Saint Gregory Nazianzus, commented that war is the mother of taxes. I think that’s a wonderful thing to keep in mind: war is the mother of taxes. And it’s also, of course, the mother of inflation.”
– “the class known as the decurions. This was your prosperous, small- and middle-landowning class who were the dominant elements of the cities of the Roman Empire. They were the class from whom the municipal counsels, magistrates, and officials were chosen. . . . they had donated, not merely their time, but also their wealth to the betterment of the urban environment. Building stadiums and bathhouses, and repairing the streets and providing for pure water were considered benefactions. It was a kind of philanthropic act and their reward was, of course, public recognition and esteem. . . .The central government could no longer collect its taxes effectively, so they made the decurion class collectively responsible for getting revenues and passing them on to the imperial government. The decurions, of course, had as much difficulty as anyone else in doing this, and the returns were, again, frequently inadequate. So the government solved that problem by simply passing a law that any taxes that decurions could not collect from others, they would have to pay out of their own pockets.”
– “merchants and artisans were now compelled to make deliveries of goods. So that if you had a factory for making garments, you now had to deliver so many garments to the government requisitions. If you had ships, you had to carry government goods in your ships. In other words, what we have here is a kind of nationalization of private enterprises, and this nationalization means that the people who use their money and their talent are now compelled to serve the state whether they like it or not. When people tried to get out of this they were then, by law, compelled to remain in the occupation that they were in. In other words, you couldn’t change your job or your business. This was not sufficient because, after all, death is a relief from taxes. So the occupations were now made hereditary. When you died, your son had to take up your profession. If your father was a shoemaker, you had to be a shoemaker. These laws started by being restricted to the defense-oriented industries but, of course, gradually it was realized that everything is defense-oriented.”
– “The Roman people, the mass of the population, had but one wish after being captured by the barbarians: to never again fall under the rule of the Roman bureaucracy.”
Depression is an important condition to understand. Time of year has a relation to human depression. And vitamins also have a bearing on human depression.
During winter there is reduced light which has a relation to depression. And reduced light means less assimilation of proteins and vitamins that affect depression.
Russia did some important research and actual work in combating the effects of reduced light in humans.
Furthermore, those who spend most of their time inside insulated from the sun for the limited hours of its availability demonstrate propensity toward depression or similar mental states.
This is demonstrated by increased proclivity for discussing morbid or depressing subjects.
Therefore, it is important to ward off this human condition and spend several hours several times a week in the sunshine.
This condition of depression is often found in former military and referred to as post stress syndrome. Usually those affected do not recognize the condition nor do anything about it.
Enough said…
I like where this is going. Perhaps dissenting opinions are a medical condition. You know, in the Soviet Union, those Philistines unable to see the obvious benefits of communism were, in fact, sent to metal institutions. :)
Here’s my favorite line from the essay:
“The Roman people, the mass of the population, had but one wish after being captured by the barbarians: to never again fall under the rule of the Roman bureaucracy.“
There is a difference between dissenting opinions and depressing subjects.
People generally do better, feel better after uplifting experience. That experience can just be good humor or cheerful subject.
Once someone has looked evil in the eye, it is never forgotten. But its negativity can be diminished over time with good and cheerful and up lifting experiences. Sometimes the person who has experienced the result of evil or malevolence needs help snapping back to reality. Maybe needs to express the problems observed.
Some survived the gulags…