Isaac Jan Alexander Gogel Quotes
It is necessary, Sire, to levy a tax which weighs equally on all those that are liable. Here. Sire, is the touchstone which the grand proprietors would like to evade … which is why their protests double the more we succeed in touching the heart of the matter. Their appeal to the people is a mask behind which they conceal their designs; they are infuriated because the [tax] law admits no distinctions and seeks equality.
The very rich told the middle class that if the rich had to pay taxes there would be little money left to operate factories and buy luxuries that employed middle class merchants and artisans. Many believed the argument and were willing to pay taxes even though the richest people did not. Gogel held the line however, and the desperate need for war financing for Napoleon Bonaparte Bonaparte’s conquests caused the King to tax even the rich.
Isaac Jan Alexander Gogel, 1765-1821, Dutch Politician, Patriot & Revolutionist, Minister of Finance, Agent for Foreign Affairs, Statement to King Louis Napoleon, 1807
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As a result of years of lobbying many vested interests were getting tax exemptions for their activities. Some of the richest corporations and people paid little or no taxes. This was like the old European monarchies where the dukes and nobles got tax exemptions from the king and the middle class and poor people paid a much larger percentage of their income and wealth than did the nobility. Fairness in taxation is very difficult in practice. See {633629}
Throughout most of the world, the rich and the aristocrats have been able to reduce or eliminate their tax obligations with the burden falling more heavily on the common people. Progressive taxation was thought to be a solution, but even in the United States by the 21st century many huge corporations paid little or no taxes while there was a heavy tax burden on small companies. Rich people generally paid a smaller percentage of their income than middle class people.
This became known as the Buffet Principle—that the very rich should not pay a lower tax rate than the workers who make far less money than they do. President Barack Obama used this principle by name in calling for the 2011 Jobs Act which would eliminate some of the loopholes and exemptions by which the rich could avoid some or much or their tax obligation.
At the time, he, th richest man in America was paying a lower ta rate than his secretary, his employees and the waiter who served him lunch. The “Buffet Rule” was developed and named for him that said that wealthy people should pay a minimum rate of taxation regardless of tax credits, deductions and other means of tax avoidance.
Even on Medieval days in Europe, the wealthy barons paid lower tax rates that their lowest peasants. Relief from taxes was one of the privileges of the very rich. The practice has been made more cosmetic, but the result seems to have been the same into the 21st century.
Isaac Jan Alexander Gogel was the first minister of finance of the Batavian Republic and the Kingdom of Holland. He married Catharina van Hasselt in 1800, and had three children.
