PTP #6

From D. McCloskey

True / False / Uncertain

In the 1370s a poll tax (having nothing to do with elections: pol means “head” in Middle English) of so many shillings per head was imposed by the English king. So irritating did Englishmen find this tax that it contributed to the Peasant Revolt of 1381.

Instead of rioting in the streets, pillaging manor houses, and presenting petitions to the king, Englishmen should have congratulated the king on hitting on a tax with no costs in efficiency.

Source: D N McCloskey, The Applied Theory of Price, 2nd ed. (New York: Macmillan, 1985), 314

Topics: public-economics , taxation , efficiency