Irving Berlin on Taxes

http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/2016/01/irving-berlin-on-taxes.html

Friday, January 01, 2016

Chris Dillow on our "narcisstocracy":

Irving Berlin on taxes: The New York Times reports on how some of the US's richest men are dodging taxes. Compare this to the response of Irving Berlin when his lawyer offered him a tax shelter:

I want to pay taxes. I love this country.

He even wrote a song expressing this sentiment. He said: “I owe all my success to my adopted country.” ...

He embodied -- knowingly so -- a point made by Herbert Simon, that we westerners owe our fortunes not so much to our own efforts but to the good luck of living in societies which enable us to prosper - which have peace, the rule of law and material and intellectual resources ...

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