The Missing Middle Classes, Part II: War, Taxes, And Socialism
What happened to the middles classes? Three things happened to them: war, socialism, and what we can call, borrowing a term, the great secession. We can start with war. All governments routinely soak their citizens or subjects to pay for their wars, and that is why the first income tax was introduced into England in 1798 to pay for the war with revolutionary France. It was rescinded on the signing of the Peace of Amiens, but reinstated with the renewal of hostilities a year later. A year after the Battle of Waterloo it was repealed again, in 1816. Then the...