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income tax

(Encyclopedia)income tax, assessment levied upon individual or corporate incomes. Although personal incomes were occasionally taxed in medieval Italian cities, the income tax is essentially a modern form of taxatio...

corporation tax

(Encyclopedia)corporation tax, imposts levied by federal, state, or local governments against corporations, their income, or their peculiar attributes, such as charters, capitalization, dividends, and franchises. I...

tax exemption

(Encyclopedia)tax exemption, immunity from the requirement of paying taxes. Federal, state, and usually local law provide exemption from taxation for a wide variety of organizations, usually not-for-profit, such as...

estate tax

(Encyclopedia)estate tax: see inheritance tax. ...

inheritance tax

(Encyclopedia)inheritance tax, assessment made on the portion of an estate received by an individual; it differs from an estate tax, which is a tax levied on an entire estate before it is distributed to individuals...

luxury tax

(Encyclopedia)luxury tax, levy on articles that are not essential to a normal standard of living. Such taxes may be imposed strictly for revenue purposes or they may be intended to discourage consumption of certain...

land tax

(Encyclopedia)land tax, impost levied upon real property. It is sometimes called a real estate tax, especially when assessed against both improved and unimproved land. Probably the earliest direct tax and formerly ...

poll tax

(Encyclopedia)poll tax, a capital tax levied equally on every adult in the community. Although no longer a significant source of revenue for any major country, the poll tax did provide large sums for many governmen...

tax shelter

(Encyclopedia)tax shelter: see tax exemption.

sales tax

(Encyclopedia)sales tax, levy on the sale of goods or services, generally calculated as a percentage of the selling price, and sometimes called a purchase tax. It is usually collected in the form of an extra charge...