On the income side the Budget is a burden on the capitalists only, even if, to a superficial view, parts of some taxes appear to be a burden on the workers. Without pressing the point unduly in the case of a few exceptionally placed individual workers, whose position is, or appears to be, an exception to this rule, the working class as a whole are not affected by the amount or nature of taxation. What the workers get out of capitalism — the amount and quantity of their food, clothing, accommodation, leisure. amusements, etc. — is determined not by prices or taxes but by capitalist pressure as a whole and the workers' powers of organised reisistance to it. No juggling with taxes or prices or social reforms will alter the main position — that of a subject class trying to defend itself against a dominant class — or will free the workers from poverty and insecurity. Don't be misled by the movements to alter the amount or nature of taxes and Budget expenditure. The aim, or at any rate, the effect, is merely to remove a burden from one section of the capitalists and place it on another. It is a capitalist fight, so keep out. Concentrate, instead. on abolishing capitalism.
[From an Editorial "Why the Budget does not matter", Socialist Standard, June 1936]
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