And Then There's the 8.5% For the Church of Bane's Public Works Fund

[Arturick]

In the bounty hunter game that my gf is currently running for my group, we recently stole a collection of highly recognizable weapons from a wealthy fellow in Hillsfar (Forgotten Realms).  Since these weapons were both hot and traceable, we decided to skip town to sell them in the nearby metropolis of Zhentil Keep.  I found myself thinking, "Hrm... it's a Lawful Evil town...  probably have a tariff on the sale..."

Then I realized that I had never really thought about taxes in my campaigns.  I had generally handwaved some basic property taxes for landowners, but something like a point of sale tax had never come up.

So, I found myself wondering if any of you have a sales tax/VAT in your games, or if you figure they get factored into the cost of items.  What tax related situations have actually come up in your games?

[Cyclone Joker]

That's not really how taxes worked.

Taxes were, for a huge amount of time, just a greater lord taking money from his vassals, who took from his, all the way down to the peasants. Then there were tariffs and the like, but the concept of sales tax as a whole is an incredibly new idea, historically speaking, as far as I can tell. In fact, taxation didn't even begin to resemble anything we'd properly recognize until the renaissance.

But, really, if you're worried about that, you should be more worried about the density of your gold coins.

[Libertad]

In my Shackled City game, the crooked mayor decided to impose an "adventurer's tax" on the magic item shops and people who bring in a lot of loot to town.  10% of sold good and items are taken by the government.  This is something which happens in the actual adventure.  Of course, Vhalantru would be pocketing the revenue to fund his evil deeds.

The PCs reacted by clandestinely communicating with he shop owners to sell their wares in an unmarked location (took some convincing, considering the mayor's increasingly corrupt administration), avoiding the tax entirely.

Other than that, taxes never really came up in my games.  I figured that they're just factored into the upkeep and item costs.

[veekie]

I think in the times most games are set in, the ruler generally just sets a fixed tithe for everyone living on his lands, usually varying a bit based on their ability to pay. The means simply isn't there to perform any kind of percentile taxing, which requires transaction tracking, particularly with prices in general being pretty haggleable. So the taxman's job basically is to eyeball how much a given business can afford to pay, and then claim that much.

Or it's a barter society and operates on 'gifts'.

[Nanshork]

The title of this thread amuses me because Libertarians (at least in the US) want a Nationwide Sales tax to replace the Income Tax so a Libertarian town would have a higher sales tax than normal.   


More on topic, taxation has never come up in any game that I've played.

[kitep]

My game has an income tax.  Anybody who makes over 50,000gp/year is in the 50% tax bracket.  The governments of the world has joined forces to create an uber-epic device that magically takes their share of taxes as soon as it's earned.  Works in anti-magic zones, across planes, etc.

At one point, the party got so bothered paying taxes, they started doing adventures pro bono (ie, for free).

After Obamacare was passed in the US, my fantasy world had a meeting and let people vote on national health care.  It would raise the taxes to 60%, or to 75% if it included True Resurrection.  My players voted 5-1 in favor of the 75% version.  The 1 voted for no national health care.  After months of playing, they all now wish they didn't have it (they're about 20th level and easily pay in far more than they get out)

FWIW, the original tax doesn't really matter.  I simply gave them twice the wealth I otherwise would, then took back half in taxes.  Eg, if WBL says they should get 125,000gp, I gave them 250,000gp, then took back half.  Since they voted for national health care, I do not raise the amount the get, so in the above example, they would only get 62,500gp in the end.

[awaken_D_M_golem]

Strictly by the book ... the DMG Town rules are ridiculous.

Let's say you're a Commoner 1.
The Evil King rides into town and takes your cash on hand.
A few days later, your "net worth" is the exact same as it
was before The Evil King came to town.  Heck he could
take your land, he could take your Horse, but you'd still
have your money (somehow).  The local Mafia can show
up and demand a lesser cut, hoping they don't get smacked
on the head by The Evil King.  Surprise, here's you money
shortly back to normal once again. 
  ... consider it:  The Constant Gift of Pun-pun.

[Bloody Initiate]

Given that the prices for making the goods are already lower than the prices listed in the books, I've always just assumed that any taxes are already factored into the final price. That may not be economically believable, but none of it is, I always just let stuff like this go because I favor the simplicity of set prices.

"How much does this cost?"

"Well let me look up the creation price, multiply it by four, modify it based on demand in this area, account for the size of this merchant's operation, include the sales tax of the region...."

...is just much slower and stupider than:

"10k cuz the book says it's 10k"

While I'm sure some very uninteresting people find all the possible economic factors fascinating, you occasionally have to step back from your fascination with numbers to play the game. It's similar to when you cross-class or template your character into and unrecognizable mess because doing so gives them the best statistical odds of defeating the encounters in the Monster Manual. You've just taken your numbers game too far, and someone should have told you so. Most optimizers have a basic affinity for this stuff, and pursuing it is pleasurable, but you have to be careful that you don't end up sitting at a table full of other players just playing with yourself.

[RogerWilco]

Usually in medieval times the tax as connected to easily countable things that didn't require an administration or honesty on the part of the taxpayer.

Things like number of cows, number of chimneys, surface area of owned land. Primitive forms of income tax did exist but I don't believe they were the norm.

Sales tax is a really modern concept that assumes people are at least literate enough to have an administration and be able to compute a percentage.

[RogerWilco]

The title of this thread amuses me because Libertarians (at least in the US) want a Nationwide Sales tax to replace the Income Tax so a Libertarian town would have a higher sales tax than normal.   

I don't want to derail the thread and I don't live in the USA, but that sounds like a very bad idea. It would heavily shift the tax burden to the lowest incomes as higher incomes would buy a lot of things that don't have a sales tax, or can be bought abroad in countries with very low or non-existent sales tax.
In other words, it's hard to not pay a sales tax on a jar of peanut butter or the fuel for your car, but it's easy to avoid on a ferrari, yacht, old painting, jet fuel or stock options.

[Libertad]

I don't want to derail the thread and I don't live in the USA, but that sounds like a very bad idea. It would heavily shift the tax burden to the lowest incomes as higher incomes would buy a lot of things that don't have a sales tax, or can be bought abroad in countries with very low or non-existent sales tax.
In other words, it's hard to not pay a sales tax on a jar of peanut butter or the fuel for your car, but it's easy to avoid on a ferrari, yacht, old painting, jet fuel or stock options.

That's kind of the point.  Many Libertarian groups explicitly favor policies which help the rich.

Back on topic, I agree with Veekie.  Taxes in D&D societies would be relatively simple and primitive in comparison to the percentage-based ones of our modern world.

[Nanshork]

I don't want to derail the thread and I don't live in the USA, but that sounds like a very bad idea. It would heavily shift the tax burden to the lowest incomes as higher incomes would buy a lot of things that don't have a sales tax, or can be bought abroad in countries with very low or non-existent sales tax.
In other words, it's hard to not pay a sales tax on a jar of peanut butter or the fuel for your car, but it's easy to avoid on a ferrari, yacht, old painting, jet fuel or stock options.

That's kind of the point.  Many Libertarian groups explicitly favor policies which help the rich.

Er, what?  I'm talking about the Libertarian political party here, not crazy people who label themselves as libertarians.

And food/necessities would be taxed the same as statewide sales tax, aka not at all.


And now I'm going to shut up because I don't want to clog this thread with what has the potential to turn into an argument.  Carry on.

[awaken_D_M_golem]

Core D&D economics is so F- -ed up, Pun-pun has
to spend a smidge of his powah constantly fixing things.

Now you want Pun-pun to take on the Libertarians too ?!
 

[Arturick]

I will leave the fucking boards if you don't take your fucking real world political bullshit to the Off-Topic Forum.

[Nanshork]

I will leave the fucking boards if you don't take your fucking real world political bullshit to the Off-Topic Forum.

...this is the biggest overreaction I have seen in a very long time.  I'm definitely done with this thread.

[Cyclone Joker]

I will leave the fucking boards if you don't take your fucking real world political bullshit to the Off-Topic Forum.

Especially given that you started if with the explicit reference to real-life politics? And the fact that it was pretty much inevitable for it to pop up? Yeah, no. Look, kid, get over it.  Or quit the board like you say, I really don't think anyone will complain.

This is especially true considering how nobody flipped out over your... let's just be excessively polite and call it ignorance, on the subject, the history of taxes.

So, yeah, get over yourself. I really don't think anyone here has the inclination to bother with some butthurt libertarian kid.

[Agita]

Overreaction or not, take the real world politics to the perfectly good real world politics thread and get back on topic. The discussion was already going back by itself, no reason to keep hawking on the matter.

[Arturick]

This is especially true considering how nobody flipped out over your... let's just be excessively polite and call it ignorance, on the subject, the history of taxes.

I don't give a flying crap about the history of taxes because the history of taxes doesn't include:  people with magical powers, people dragging items worth more than the GDP of the continent out of tombs, dragons, or gods who stop by during dinner to chat about their investments.

D&D is a mix of medeival styling layered over concepts that are exceedingly modern and combined with stuff that never happened.  If I have a magical metropolis in my D&D game, it will generally resemble Chicago of the 1920's more than Florence of the 1400's.

If you've got a Wizard in town who is capable of generating 1000gp in economic value EVERY day, and a Turnip Farmer who might clear a 10gp profit for the year, it makes no sense to have them taxed via the same methodology, especially if that methodology is an irrelevant Feudal English land tax.

I used the term "Libertarian" just to throw out a concept that is usually associated with a low taxation philosophy.  I apologize.  I will not make the same mistake again.  <--Please don't acknowledge or address this point in any fashion besides PM.

[Cyclone Joker]

I don't give a flying crap about the history of taxes because the history of taxes doesn't include:  people with magical powers, people dragging items worth more than the GDP of the continent out of tombs, dragons, or gods who stop by during dinner to chat about their investments.

...So? Unless you're playing in the Tippyverse, the vast majority of games are in a bizarre medieval stasis. This is apparent even in FR and every other stock setting WotC made that I can think of beyond Darksun and Spelljammers, and even most of the ones in this forum. This is especially, nay painfully obvious if you do such an incredibly arcane practice known as "lurking."

Take some prozac, chill, and lurk some more.

D&D is a mix of medeival styling layered over concepts that are exceedingly modern and combined with stuff that never happened.  If I have a magical metropolis in my D&D game, it will generally resemble Chicago of the 1920's more than Florence of the 1400's.

...  First off, seriously? The kind of infrastructure required renders it pretty absurd. Second, and really more importantly, why should we care? If you're going to just ignore the pretty obvious and crippling problems with that, why even bring up taxation in the first place?

This appears to just be a massive "One True Way^tm" bait thread.

If you've got a Wizard in town who is capable of generating 1000gp in economic value EVERY day, and a Turnip Farmer who might clear a 10gp profit for the year, it makes no sense to have them taxed via the same methodology, especially if that methodology is an irrelevant Feudal English land tax.

Again, captain ignorance, to the rescue! Next are you going to complain about Farmer Turnip and Count von Taxalot paying the same way? Seriously, even if you didn't know this stuff, five minutes of googling would do you a lot more good than being butthurt.

And, more importantly, why is this wizard producing that much wealth, that little wealth, and who is really going to actually take the taxes from this wizard?

Look, kid, lurk some more. Or at least learn to bait better.

[Sinfire Titan]

Look, kid, lurk some more. Or at least learn to bait better.

You're one to talk. Cut it out.