What matters is not the rhetoric in the speeches of politicians but rather the power in the hands of prosecutors and law-enforcement agents. Governments rest upon the statute book. The essence of a law is the threat of government force to compel obedience to a legislative or regulatory edict. The first question is not whether government is good or evil, but whether government is coercive - whether government relies on force to fill its coffers, enforce its commands, and impose its will. To get a clear understanding of the pervasive use and threat of force in daily government actions is the first step towards political realism.
Few issues make the nature of the state clearer than taxation.
The average American worked until May 10 in 1998 simply to pay his taxes, according to the Tax Foundation. The average family with two earners paid nearly as much in taxes in 1998 as their total nominal earnings in 1980. Taxation permeates the lives of modern Americans. Taxation, the citizen, and the state Taxation is not a mere technicality to be relegated to the footnotes of political science and public administration. Every increase in taxation is a proclamation that government knows best and thus that politicians are entitled to commandeer more of the individual's paycheck and to save him from himself.