A Statement of Tax Concepts to be Used as A Basis for Teaching Income Taxation.

Abstract This article presents a statement of tax concepts to be used at a basis for teaching income taxation. A tax is an exaction from the populace to pay for the cost of government. The sources from which funds are attracted to the government are many and varied, and the expenditure of those funds is determined by the complex interplay of political, social and economic means and ends. With the broad concept of taxation, but, specifically, with its application to the area of income taxation. Until the twentieth century, the taxing power of the federal government was exercised with restraint. The costs of the central government were met chiefly from excise taxes on tobacco and whiskey, customs revenue, and proceeds from the sale of public lands. The extraordinary costs of the wars which spot our national history temporarily called for additions to the excise lists, but these were generally of very short duration, expiring upon repayment of war costs. For more than one-half of the nineteenth century there were no federal taxes except for duties on imports.