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Taxes Quotations




Unknown Author (top)
A person doesn't know how much he has to be thankful for until he has to pay taxes on it.
- Unknown Author
Did you ever notice that when you put the words "The" and "IRS" together, it spells "THEIRS?"
- Unknown Author
People who complain about taxes can be divided into two classes: men and women.
- Unknown Author
Taxes: Of life's two certainties, the only one for which you can get an automatic extension.
- Unknown Author
The best things in life are free, but sooner or later the government will find a way to tax them.
- Unknown Author


Dave Barry (top)
Of course the truth is that the congresspersons are too busy raising campaign money to read the laws they pass. The laws are written by staff tax nerds who can put pretty much any wording they want in there. I bet that if you actually read the entire vastness of the U.S. Tax Code, you'd find at least one sex scene ("'Yes, yes, YES!' moaned Vanessa as Lance, his taut body moist with moisture, again and again depreciated her adjusted gross rate of annualized fiscal debenture").
- Dave Barry
Question: " I understand that Congress is considering a so-called 'flat' tax system. How would this work?" Answer: "If Congress were to pass a 'flat' tax, you'd simply pay a fixed percentage of your income, and you wouldn't have to fill out any complicated forms, and there would be no loopholes for politically connected groups, and normal people would actually understand the tax laws, and giant talking broccoli stalks would come around and mow your lawn for free, because Congress is NOT going to pass a flat tax, you pathetic fool."
- Dave Barry


Dan Bennett (top)
There's nothing wrong with the younger generation that becoming taxpayers won't cure.
- Dan Bennett


Nancie J. Carmody (top)
I am thankful for the taxes I pay because it means that I'm employed.
- Nancie J. Carmody


Calvin Coolidge (top)
Collecting more taxes than is absolutely necessary is legalized robbery.
- Calvin Coolidge


Charles Dickens (top)
It was as true... as taxes is. And nothing's truer than them.
- Charles Dickens


Albert Einstein (top)
The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax.
- Albert Einstein


Ralph Waldo Emerson (top)
Of all debts, men are least willing to pay their taxes; what a satire this is on government.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson


Benjamin Franklin (top)
Friends and neighbors complain that taxes are indeed very heavy, and if those laid on by the government were the only ones we had to pay, we might the more easily discharge them; but we have many others, and much more grievous to some of us. We are taxed twice as much by our idleness, three times as much by our pride, and four times as much by our folly.
- Benjamin Franklin


Arthur Godfrey (top)
I'm proud to pay taxes in the United States; the only thing is, I could be just as proud for half the money.
- Arthur Godfrey


Barry Goldwater (top)
The income tax created more criminals than any other single act of government.
- Barry Goldwater


Robert A. Heinlein (top)
Be wary of strong drink. It can make you shoot at tax collectors... and miss.
- Robert A. Heinlein


John Andrew Holmes (top)
If the Lord loveth a cheerful giver, how he must hate the taxpayer!
- John Andrew Holmes


Oliver Wendell, Sr. Holmes (top)
Any tax is a discouragement and therefore a regulation so far as it goes.
- Oliver Wendell, Sr. Holmes
I like to pay taxes. With them I buy civilization.
- Oliver Wendell, Sr. Holmes


Thomas Jefferson (top)
The purse of the people is the real seat of sensibility. Let it be drawn upon largely, and they will then listen to truths which could not excite them through any other organ.
- Thomas Jefferson


Mignon McLaughlin (top)
Philosophy teaches a man that he can't take it with him; taxes teach him he can't leave it behind either.
- Mignon McLaughlin


Henry Louis Mencken (top)
Taxation, for example, is eternally lively; it concerns nine-tenths of us more directly than either smallpox or golf, and has just as much drama in it; moreover, it has been mellowed and made gay by as many gaudy, preposterous theories.
- Henry Louis Mencken
Unquestionably, there is progress. The average American now pays out twice as much in taxes as he formerly got in wages.
- Henry Louis Mencken


Alfred E. Newman (top)
Today, it takes more brains and effort to make out the income-tax form than it does to make the income.
- Alfred E. Newman


Thomas Paine (top)
If, from the more wretched parts of the old world, we look at those which are in an advanced stage of improvement, we still find the greedy hand of government thrusting itself into every corner and crevice of industry, and grasping the spoil of the multitude. Invention is continually exercised, to furnish new pretenses for revenues and taxation. It watches prosperity as its prey and permits none to escape without tribute.
- Thomas Paine
What at first was plunder assumed the softer name of revenue.
- Thomas Paine


Laurence J. Peter (top)
America is a land of taxation that was founded to avoid taxation.
- Laurence J. Peter


Plato (top)
When there is an income tax, the just man will pay more and the unjust less on the same amount of income.
- Plato


Jewish Proverb (top)
Taxes grow without rain.
- Jewish Proverb


Ronald Reagan (top)
The taxpayer - that's someone who works for the federal government but doesn't have to take the civil service examination.
- Ronald Reagan


David Rockefeller (top)
You know, gentlemen, that I do not owe any personal income tax. But nevertheless, I send a small check, now and then, to the Internal Revenue Service out of the kindness of my heart.
- David Rockefeller


Will Rogers (top)
The income tax has made more liars out of the American people than golf has. Even when you make a tax form out on the level, you don't know when it's through if you are a crook or a martyr.
- Will Rogers
If you make any money, the government shoves you in the creek once a year with it in your pockets, and all that don't get wet you can keep.
- Will Rogers


Franklin D. Roosevelt (top)
Taxes are paid in the sweat of every man who labors.
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
Taxes, after all, are dues that we pay for the privileges of membership in an organized society.
- Franklin D. Roosevelt


Bob Thaves (top)
I don't know if I can live on my income or not - the government won't let me try it.
- Bob Thaves


Mark Twain (top)
I shall never use profanity except in discussing house rent and taxes.
- Mark Twain
What is the difference between a taxidermist and a tax collector? The taxidermist takes only your skin.
- Mark Twain


J.C. Watts (top)
Death and taxes may be inevitable, but they shouldn't be related.
- J.C. Watts