Comparative Taxation of Rich and Poor.

57

to be a poor man, and voluntarily steps into the tax-paying class. If he has a surplus to expend in luxury, he is no longer entitled to sue in forma pauperis; he ceases to be an object of charity or of exemption. If he drinks his gallon of spirits, or smokes his pound of tobacco, why should he not pay on that gallon or that pound as much as the rich man would do? If the rich man indulges, as he is able to indulge, in a double quantity, he pays a double tax. There can be no inequity in this.

But, as a matter of fact, is an unfair proportion, even of taxes on the consumption of luxuries, paid by the working classes? Do they, on the whole, contribute to the revenue at all more than, regard being had to their number, they ought to do? Let us look a little into detail. It is impossible to ascertain with accuracy what proportion the propertied classes in this country bear to the labouring classes, or prolétaires, as they are called among our neighbours, or how far the distinction between the two is a valid one; for there are comparatively few among the rich who do not work, and increasingly few among the poor who possess no property of any kind. But, from several indications there is reason to believe that we shall not be wide of the

* We will put down here a few of those known facts from which we have felt ourselves warranted in drawing the inferences in the text. We are aware that these inferences can scarcely reach beyond highly probable conjectures, but we are desirous that our readers should not imagine them to be mere random guesses. 1. The number of registered electors in the United Kingdom was, in 1850, by official returns, 1,050,187. Now, it is probable that the number of non-electors in the propertied classes would be about balanced by the number of electors among the prolétaires. If we suppose all, or nearly all, of these to be heads of families, (or those who are not to be equal in number to the women, not registered, who are,) this would give a total population to the propertied classes (at five to a family) of 5,250,000.

2. By the census of 1841 we got returns of the occupations of 7,850,000 persons in Great Britain, out of a total of 18,850,000. Of these, 760,000 (or those who are returned as independent, educated persons following miscellaneous pursuits, professional men, government civil servants, local, church, and law officers) clearly belonged to the middle and upper ranks. Of the remaining 7,090,000, (consisting of those employed in commerce, agriculture, army and navy, domestic servants, common labourers, &c.) we cannot be wrong in supposing that naval and military officers, farmers, master manufacturers, merchants, clerks, and shopkeepers, would amount to at least 1,000,000. This would give in all 1,760,000, out of 7,850,000, as belonging to classes above the condition of day-labourers and prolétaires, or nearly one-fourth.

3. The class of domestic servants reached 1,135,612 in 1831, and in 1841 had increased to 1,691,679. We shall not therefore exceed the mark if we take their numbers now at 2,000,000. These are, of course, entirely confined to families of the upper and middle ranks; and the whole of the indirect taxes levied on their consumption of taxed articles is paid by those ranks. The propertied classes pay not only on their own consumption, which is much larger per head than that in the lower ranks, but on the consumption of two millions of the lower classes besides,

Once for all, be it observed, we give these estimates, and others that follow, merely for what they are worth. They are carefully made; but we know from long use in statistical calculations how liable such are to error, and we therefore give our readers not only the results but the data on which we base them, so that they may judge for themselves.

mark if we reckon the former at one-fourth and the latter at three-fourths of the community. There are certain items in the Customs and Excise duties which we know are paid wholly by the rich. There are other items of which the rich consume, and on which, therefore, they pay, far more per head than the poor: such are tea, sugar, and coffee. Now, an examination into the detail of the expenditure of different families in various grades on these articles, leads us to believe that three-fourths of the tea and coffee that pay duty, and two-thirds of the sugar, are consumed in the houses of the propertied classes. This is the result of careful and extensive private inquiries. Among the agricultural poor, the men scarcely ever touch either tea or coffee, and we have ascertained, from personal inquiry, that the quantities purchased by the women for their own drinking are excessively small. Among the artisan population the consumption is much greater. But in the case of the rich and easy classes, not only is the consumption great individually, but they pay for the consumption of their servants. Now, the annual consumption of tea in Great Britain is, per head of the whole population, 23 oz. The consumption of families in the upper classes, where there are three or four servants, is 8 lbs., or 128 oz. per head. The usual allowance to servants is 6 lbs., or 96 oz. per head, just four times that of the average. In the case of sugar the average annual consumption throughout the country is 24 lbs. a head. But the male agricultural population use scarcely any, while the usual consumption of the shop-keeping and higher artisan class is 26 lbs.; that of the middle class 50 lbs. ; that of the higher 70 lbs. a head. Now, let us construct an approximate table on these data, admitting freely that they are scarcely more than careful and conjectural estimates.

Customs,

Total Produce of the Ordinary Revenue levied in 1849.

Excise,

Stamps,

Taxes,

Income-Tax,

Post-Office, (Net)

£2,268,864

15,003,098

7,013,267

4,522,910

5,564,833

832,000

£55,204,972

£55,204,972

In round numbers, that is, the comparatively few people of property pay two and a half times as much taxation as the comparatively many prolétaires. The working classes, who constitute three-fourths of the community, pay twenty millions, while the propertied, or upper and middle classes, who amount only to one-fourth, pay forty-four millions, or, as our total population is about twenty-eight millions, the former pay not quite £1 a head, while the latter pay £6, 10s. 6d., or six and a half times as much. This scarcely sounds like the inequity complained of.

The working classes then clearly pay far less in proportion to

their numbers than the higher and middle ranks: do they not pay less also in proportion to their incomes? Here, again, we are thrown back upon the region of plausible conjecture; for we are without the data to enable us to ascertain accurately the relative incomes of the different ranks. A few considerations, however, may serve to shew that the above question is not so irrational as it may at first appear.

1. The incomes of those who have more than £150 a year appear by the Income-tax returns to amount in Great Britain to £185,000,000.

2. The number of domestic servants in Great Britain (excluding Ireland, as in the last case) is above 1,400,000, and their incomes, male and female, (including keep, or board wages,) could not be less than £35 each, (Porter, vol. iii. p. 16,) or above £50,000,000,-the sum yielded by Schedule D. Their wages alone will be about £13 a head.

3. The population of Great Britain (in all these calculations we are obliged to leave Ireland aside) is now twenty-one millions, of whom the working classes, according to our previous data, will form about fifteen millions and three-quarters. Deducting from these the domestic servants, there will be left above fourteen millions and a quarter, or about three millions of families. Now, what is the income of these families on an average, taking into account all the trades and occupations into which they are divided, agricultural labourers, artisans, mechanics, factory hands, journeymen tailors, shoemakers, engine-drivers, &c. &c.? From the Official Report on the employment of women and children in agriculture, it appears that the actual earnings of a family of peasants are much greater even in the worst paid districts than it is usual to represent them. The lowest seems to be 10s. a week, and they often exceed 20s. or 25s.* It is difficult, after reading that Report, to believe that 13s. a week is not rather below than above the yearly average. In the manufacturing districts, many single artisans earn double this sum—women and children often more than half-many families three or four times as much. Handloom weavers, no doubt, are below this; journeymen tailors, shoemakers, and other handicraftsmen generally much above; mechanics and engine-men, colliers, men employed in iron works, greatly above. On the whole, we believe we shall be below the mark in taking the average earnings of a family at 20s. a week, or say £50 a year. But, as we are aware that at first sight our calculations will appear extreme to

* Those who are startled by a statement so much at variance with their preconceived impressions, will find our view fully borne out by the careful investigations of the Official Commissioners referred to.

Taxation of Upper and Lower Classes.

61

many, whose opinions have been formed from speeches and writings of popular or party controversialists, and as we wish to be always within the mark, we will, at the suggestion of the first statistical authority in England, take £40 instead of £50 as the average. This, for three millions of families, would give £120,000,000, to which we must add £20,000,000 for the mere wages of the class of domestic servants. We take their wages only, not their maintenance, because the taxation on the articles they consume is paid by their masters, and our present object is simply a comparison between the tax-paying income of the several classes. We thus arrive at £140,000,000 as the aggregate income of the working classes of Great Britain.

4. The income of the class who are above the working classes, and yet below £150 a year, we can only guess at. Probably we shall not be far wrong if we take it at £50,000,000. This we must add to the £185,000,000, the income of those who have more than £150 a year. This gives a total income for the middle and upper classes of £235,000,000.

5. But we have just seen that the working classes pay only (leaving Ireland as before wholly aside, and supposing no class there to contribute anything) £20,000,000 out of a revenue of £66,000,000. Now £20,000,000 of taxes on an income of £140,000,000 is about 14 per cent. But £45,000,000 (the amount paid as we have seen by the propertied classes) on £235,000,000, is not 14 per cent., but nearly 20.

In the course of our empirical proceedings in fiscal matters, though nothing like system or science has yet been developed, our experience has brought about the recognition of two or three important truths. Of these the most valuable are the connection between a flourishing revenue and a cheap and abundant supply of the necessaries of life, and the superior productiveness of moderate over high duties. The almost invariable concomitance between a low price of corn and an increased consumption of exciseable articles, not only directed public attention to the discovery, that the one is a logical sequence of the other, but enabled even Chancellors of the Exchequer to draw the conclusion, that as food and clothing must in the expenditure of all classes take precedence of any other articles of consumption, it is only on the surplus, after these are supplied, that the State can effectively levy its demands. Hence we may hope that it will henceforth be one of the principal objects of all governments to keep provisions cheap, and that even in our times of most pressing emergency, we shall never again see any proposal for imposing taxes upon food or other articles of first necessity.-The many remarkable instances, also, which our financial history affords of a rapid rise in the revenue arising from duties on