George Keyes--The Taxman's Pleasantries: Voltaire's 21st Century Rant On Rich And Poor

The 21st century, where the world has become an interactive digital playground, full of apps, cryptocurrency, and gig economy jobs. One might think that with all this technological innovation, we would have found a way to simplify the act of taxation.

Instead, the tax code has become a beast—a ravenous creature that consumes not just your income, but your time, your mental health, and your sense of decency. Each year, we dutifully submit our tax returns, only to find that despite having worked harder than ever, we owe more than we did last year.

And with the tax brackets ever shifting, you can never quite tell how much you actually owe—is it 20%? 30%? Perhaps you’ll only find out after your bank account has been drained and you’re staring at an IRS notice that demands payment on penalty of public humiliation.

What’s worse—and this is where the rich play their most ingenious game—is that the wealthy, those glorious paragons of virtue, have found ways to sidestep the system entirely. No! Wait!

Take Amazon, for instance. A company that rakes in billions every year, while somehow managing to pay less in taxes than a middle-class worker who buys coffee with a credit card that has a high-interest rate. Now that is what I would call creative taxation—a system where the rich pay less and the poor pay more, and yet everyone cheers when they announce,

And let us not forget the annual ritual of the “Tax Reform Bill”—a spectacle that is trotted out like a magician’s trick every election year. Tax cuts for the middle class are promised, increased taxes for the rich are hinted at, and by the time the bill is passed, everyone finds that their taxes have gone up, but the rich have mysteriously found a way to lower theirs—again.

Then there is the cryptocurrency craze—oh, what a delight it is. New forms of wealth that cannot be taxed, or so we are led to believe. The billionaires have finally discovered a way to transcend the system altogether—bitcoin, NFTs, and tax havens, oh my! Meanwhile, you and I are busy scrambling to figure out how to pay taxes on our part-time freelance gigs, while Elon Musk tweets about the next big tax loophole he’s found. What a fair and just world we live in!

Yet, every year, it’s the same charade. We all must pay—or at least try to. The tax forms remain a mystery, a bizarre puzzle crafted by wealthy lawyers to ensure that only those with enough money can truly understand how to play the game. For the rest of us, it’s simply a matter of guessing and hoping that the IRS doesn’t come knocking at your door asking for the 5th year of back taxes you “accidentally forgot to file.”

Each year, we are told that this year’s tax reform will be the one that will finally fix everything. Each year, we are given one more bill, one more form, and one more promise that this time, we’ll really see a difference. But, alas, by the end of the year, we’re back at the same place where we started—confused, broke, fucked up, and looking for the nearest tax preparer. But let’s be fair—the government, in its infinite wisdom, has provided us with stimulus checks, tax credits, and free health insurance plans that—wait, let me check—are all temporary. Ah yes, the government is the first to hand you the knife, and the last to remind you that it will be pulling it out of your back in a few months. The American Rescue Plan? Oh yes, a lovely idea, but somehow, like a shotgun wedding, it didn’t quite stick around long enough to save the day.

Then we must ask ourselves: what if Voltaire, that cheeky philosopher and critic, were here in the 21st century? What would he think of our tax system, with its chronic absurdities, its endless bureaucratic nonsense, and its sincere commitment to maintaining the status quo? Well, I believe he’d laugh, and with all his satirical wisdom, he would declare: "This, my dear friends, is not a tax system. It is a glorious comedy of errors. A play in which the rich laugh at the expense of the poor, the middle class is left holding the bill, and we all stand around wondering how we managed to get so exploited."

But let us not forget: the rich pay less and less while we, the common folk, pay more and more. It’s the perfect crime, so well hidden that it seems invisible, yet we know it is there. It is a taxation system that promises fairness, yet delivers only paradox and absurdity. And every year, the curtain falls on the same show, as the politicians promise a new act—one that promises to be different, only for the cycle to repeat.

So, dear reader, as you submit your tax returns this year, remember this: You are not alone in your confusion. You are part of a much larger play, one that has been unfolding for centuries, and will continue to unfold for as long as taxes exist. The only difference is, you won’t find your name on the program.

This version takes Voltaire’s biting humor to the 21st century, incorporating real-life modern examples like the rich avoiding taxes, stimulus checks, and the cryptocurrency craze—all wrapped in the absurdity of temporary fixes. The irony and repetition of the system’s failures are used to show how little has truly changed from Voltaire’s time to now, despite the promises of progress.

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