Today is a Monday of stories...
They say that this was real...
They say that in the time of the last kings of France, before the French Revolution, during the "despotism" when the King was "the State", a tax collector approached his king with the new proposal to increase tax collection.
The tax collector proposed to collect more taxes from the rich of the kingdom.
Then the king, very complacent, seeing the naivety of his subordinate said to him:
"No, my dear subject.
Not the rich.
Almost all of them are my friends and if we make them angry they will no longer invite me to parties, parties, christenings, weddings, etc.
All of them and us are beautiful people, and we can't do that to them.
Besides ...
How many rich people are there in the kingdom?
How much more could we collect?
No, no, no.
That's out of the question.
Besides, they have money and power and they can leave us to another kingdom taking everything with them.
But I thank you and forgive you, because you don't have the knowledge that I have."
The collector left, agitated, to prepare a new proposal.
When he presented it to the king the latter said:
"To the poor?
Noooooo, my dear subject, neither.
Where can we take taxes from them?
They barely have enough to eat.
They will never get out of their poverty.
No, don't mess with them.
Leave them as they are.
That way they live happy and calm; without ambitions.
There's no need to disturb them.
Besides, they are the ones who vote."
Then the subordinate, already all disoriented, asked the king:
"Then, your majesty, guide me, what do you suggest to me in order to be able to collect more taxes for the crown?"
And the king said to him:
"Charge more to those of the middle class, to the bourgeois, to the professionals, to the merchants, to the academics, to the scientists, to the musicians, and so on.
To those, yes".
And the collector replied:
"But your majesty, we are already taxing them.
We always raise taxes on them.
They will be angry.
And the king replied:
"That's possible, but the middle class has something that the other classes don't have: they have dreams and ambitions.
Their biggest dream is to be rich one day.
And so they study and study and study; they work and work and work and work.
And yes, they will be upset about having to pay more taxes, but their dream will be greater than their anger, and that is why they will continue studying and studying and studying and studying and working and working and working and working with the illusion of becoming rich someday.
But we do not want them to become rich either, because then, who would pay taxes?
For these reasons they should be taxed more.
Remember, the poor vote, the middle class pays taxes and the rich are the owners of everything we have, they celebrate us and invite us to their parties".
The taxman was impressed by his majesty's wisdom and mental acuity, and went off to tax the middle class more."
*Any coincidence with real life is pure imagination*.
An enjoyable story. It's sad but partly still true.