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Rh tax increased from $12.98 per capita in 1903 to $23.29 in 1919; and the earnings of public service enterprises rose from $2.42 per capita in 1903 to $3.61 per capita in 1919. As stated above, the relative importance of the last class of receipts declined slightly during the period under review.

The most important aspects of American taxation during the decade 1910-20 are those connected with the rates and the aggregate burden of taxation. Direct taxes were pushed to a height thought to be impossible before the war. The maximum rate under the Federal income tax is 73%, and this is supplemented in some places by a state income tax which, in Wisconsin for instance, exceeds at the maximum 13 per cent. Corporations have been subject to equally drastic taxes. The war profits tax for 1918 was 80% on profits in excess of a deduction which in the average case only slightly exceeded 10% of the invested capital; and corporations paid in addition a 12% income tax, a capital stock tax, and state or local taxes which frequently exceeded (in theory, at least) 2% of the capital value of the property of the corporation.

In addition there were miscellaneous Federal taxes important enough to have produced over fifteen hundred millions of dollars in the year 1920. This unprecedented taxation placed upon business a serious burden, brought about a complexity of law and procedure hitherto unknown in the United States, and threw upon the administrative machinery tasks difficult enough to cause grave congestion and delay. In July 1921 there was a systematic effort, particularly among business men, to replace the direct taxes in large part by a flat tax at a low rate (1% was usually recommended) upon all sales of goods, wares and merchandise. It was urged primarily in order to “simplify” the tax system, to take the place of the excess profits tax and reduce the rates of the income tax. Its opponents attacked it as an attempt to shift the burden of taxation from those who had income or profits, and were thus “able to pay,” to the general class of consumers; and asserted that it would discriminate in favour of the “combination” and against the independent or single-process business. In the United States this controversy assumed an importance worthy of historical record. It marked a reaction from the high tide of direct taxation which during the war supplied more than three-quarters of the entire tax revenue. It was also worthy of record that in the midst of the industrial depression prevailing in 1921 there was no discernible movement in favour of meeting the expenses of Government by the issue of paper money or by borrowing.

In state and local taxation real progress toward the solution of the more important problems was made during the decade. The gradual abrogation of the old “iron rule of constitutional uniformity” (taxation of all classes of property at the same rate) continued. Gradually, but without material setback, law and practice were being modified so as to adapt the general property tax to the peculiar needs of the different classes of property or business, such as forest land, the mining industry, and public service enterprises. Low rates were in a constantly increasing number of jurisdictions applied to money and securities, which go into hiding if an attempt is made to tax them at the rate applicable to real estate and tangible property; or this class of intangible property was exempted from the property tax and subjected to special taxes such as the mortgage registry tax, or the income tax. With three exceptions all American states employ some form of the inheritance tax. With the Federal Government imposing an estate tax which rises to 25% where the net estate exceeds $10,000,000; and the state Governments employing several mutually inconsistent bases of taxation, for example, taxing the transfer of all corporate shares owned by resident decedents and the transfer of all corporate shares in domestic corporations owned by non-resident decedents, problems of double or multiple taxation were becoming particularly serious; and an almost unbearable situation promised to arise unless in some manner state

and Federal laws could be made both uniform and consistent. Automobile and hunting licence taxes were rapidly increasing in importance, and together yielded approximately as much as the state inheritance taxes (about fifty million dollars a year). In recent years there has been a marked improvement in the administration of state and local taxes, particularly in the work of assessment. Much of this is attributable to the development of state tax commissions charged usually with the assessment of state-wide corporations, the administration of the income tax where such a tax is in force, the equalization of assessments among local districts, and the supervision of the work of the county or local assessors. It is worthy of note that in recent years the movement for the segregation or separation of state and local taxes has abated. In 1921 there was a marked tendency towards centralization of administration and the collections by state officials or under state supervision of taxes which are later returned in part to the local divisions of government.

.—See H. C. Adams, Science of Finance; C. C. Plehn, Introduction to Public Finance; E. R. A. Seligman, Essays in Taxation; Bureau of the Census, Wealth, Debt and Taxation (1913); and the annual publications Financial Statistics of States and Financial Statistics of Cities. For state and local taxation, see in particular the annual Proceedings and the monthly Bulletin of the National Tax Association. (T. S. A.)

The 20th century has seen an extraordinary development in the field of social-welfare work in the United States. The number of persons interested—whether as volunteers, serving on boards and committees, or as contributors of financial support, or as salaried employees—has multiplied manyfold. Appropriations from taxes, annual contributions for the current work of privately supported organizations, and endowments by men and women of wealth, have increased enormously. New forms of social work have come into existence, and the older forms have improved their methods, as well as extended their scope. Principles have been formulated; standards have been set up; training courses have been established; general instruction has been introduced into the colleges and universities, and even to some extent into the secondary schools; a technical literature has been produced; intelligent discussion of social problems in the popular periodicals and the daily press has become common.

Social work in the United States displays certain marked characteristics which distinguish it from corresponding activities in other countries. (1) There is greater variety. In the field of private charity individual initiative has had free play, little hampered by legislative restrictions or by precedents, and comparatively little by the control of church authorities. The administration of public charitable and correctional institutions and welfare legislation are not, as in England or France, national undertakings, but for the most part fall under the jurisdiction of the states, and even within the states the bulk of responsibility lies with local authorities of city, town or county. This situation has favoured experimentation. (2) The relative amount of social work undertaken on private initiative, as compared with that done by the State, is far greater than elsewhere. (3) In private philanthropy, the relative amount carried on under religious auspices is far less. (4) Throughout the whole system of charity and correction, both public and private, there is more hope. In comparison with older countries, there has been little poverty and degeneracy in America at any period. Even in the oldest cities there is no pauper class. (5) In the United States public and private relief, charity and correction, the care of sick, criminal or indigent individuals, and the efforts to improve housing, to provide facilities for recreation, and so on, are coming to be regarded as component parts of a complicated system, not as separate and distinct departments in the economy of the nation. (6) Finally, there is in American social work something of the readiness to “scrap” machinery, processes and plants, which is characteristic of American industry. Indeed, the ultimate object of all social work, from the American point of view, is to make social work unnecessary; and every social agency which is efficiently accomplishing its immediate purpose is more or less consciously working for its own extinction. Social work, therefore, is constantly changing.

Legally, the responsibility for the relief of the poor in America rests ordinarily upon their immediate relatives. Children and