582 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION F. 



but there can be no doubt that the fear of punishment may, 

 and in lunatic asylums constantly does, have gjreat weight 

 with insane persons. It is to be hoped that this matter may 

 before long receive due attention from the Legislatures of the 

 various Colonies. • Meantime, I trust that its importance 

 will be sufficient excuse for the time which I have occupied 

 of the section. 



11.— THE INCIDENCE OF TAXATION. 



A SUMMARY OF A PAPER READ BY PRIDEAUX SELBY, ESQ., 

 BEFORE THE INSTITUTE OF BANKERS, LONDON, 5th DECEM- 

 BER, 1888. 



WITH INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 



BY 



NICHOLAS J. BROWN, Hohart. 



The students of Economic Science being desirous to promote 

 harmony amongst the various members of the body politic, 

 and to secure a just apportionment of the burden of contri- 

 bution to State funds, their attention may be usefully directed 

 to the consideration of the subject which forms the title of 

 this paper, " The Incidence of Taxation." 



There are few questions of general interest on which mis- 

 understandings, and sometimes wilful misrepresentations, are 

 so prevalent, and at the same time so mischievous to a 

 community. 



The problem being to provide the funds necessary for 

 defraying the costs and charges of Government with the least 

 possible inconvenience to those who have to contribute those 

 funds, it is not surprising that in the effort to place the 

 burden, or to appear to place the burden, in the common 

 phrase, " on the shoulders of those best able to bear it," 

 numerous expedients should be from time to time discussed, and 

 supported with more or less ingenunity and persistence by those 

 who advocate them. Popular applause, as we have seen 

 fi'equently in the various Australasian Colonies, is easily 

 secured by a loudly expressed determination to tax the so- 

 called rich property owner, and to relieve the wage-earner. 

 In times of political excitement the voices of those who 

 analyse systems of taxation, and trace out the probable effects 

 of any jiroposed impost before according to it their approval, 



