The Waterbury Democrat., 1936-10-03

In the most progressive of na- tions, where industrial technique has made wealth production 8 simple and continuous process, there seems to be almost as great deprivation and lack of modern comforts for great percentage of the people as in primitive or Semi-civilized countries.
 No process has yet been found by mankind whereby a uniform advancement of all the people toward the ideal living conditions is possible. Until within the last fifty years, the possibility of find ing and applying such a process has been so remote that it has not engaged the attention of many thinking men.
 Civilization Here
 Now, however, civilization has arrived. It has gotten some place. The modern industrial nation has finally equipped itself to produce in such abundance that the prob- lem has become, not how to pro- duce more, but how to dispose profitably of what we have.
 This problem of late years has become very acute and puzzling. We seem, on the one hand, to be attaining greater and greater abil- ity to produce our wealth of things needed for the comfort and happiness of mankind, and at the. same time are plagued with the large and steady growth of an army of men unable to obtain ac- cess to even the most meager comforts of life.
 What Is Remedy?
 What to do about it, how to start leveling process that will lift the submerged and under privileged to a rate of advance ment proportionate to that en- joyed by the more fortunate class es of men. is a matter to be set- tied quickly, if we would not see civilization start on the toboggan toward another eclipse of Its brilliance that will land us again III the 0afk ages.
 How shall the forces of up- lift, now made possible through the aid of science, be made ef- fective for all of society so as gradually to eliminate classes now created by the inequalities of wealth?
 We believe this can only be done through introducing new principles of government. THE FIRST NEW PRINCIPLE NEEDED MUST DEAL WITH TAXES. We require more
 just system of taxation than any thus far tried.
 We should abandon a system that purports to collect taxes from the citizen in proportion to the amount of his accumulations of property. This can never be a just system, since the greater accumulation one secures, the greater power one acquires to evade making his just contribu- tion to the burden of taxation. And, conversely, the less property one has, the less able he is to avoid paying more than his just share.
 Tax Cheating
 No absolutely just and fair system of taxation can be estab- lished until all of US are ready to quit trying to cheat the tax col- lecting agencies. But we could approximate fairness If we estab- lished the rule that each and every individual be required to pay tax on everything ne bought at the time of purchase.
 This rule would entail the
 passing of a law making all
 sales illegal that did not at
 once bear evidence of the tax
 being paid at the prevailing
 rate. In other words, every in-
 dividual in the land should be
 compelled to pay taxes in &C.,
 c0rdance with the volume of his
 expenditure for commodities
 and services.
 The rate, of course, should be the same for all. A very low rate would produce a very large amount of money if all sales made up a like percentage of the value of the sale. Buyers would pay the tax in the price paid for the article bought. thus making the payment painless and un- noticeable. The collection of the tax would have to be made through the sellers, and could be effected by means of a stamp tax system operated through the post offices, just as we now stamp our letters to pay for the service of delivery.
 Tremendous Revenue Some idea of the amount of tax procurable under a universal sales tax system may be obtained if we determine the aggregate of business transactions required to produce the net wealth of the individual or the nation at the