Taxes

A tax is a compulsory monetary charge or other levy imposed on an individual or a legal entity by a nation or a functional equivalent of the government (e.g., tribes, secessionist movements or revolutionary movements).

Taxes may be paid in cash or in kind . In modern capitalist taxation systems, taxes are levied in cash. In kind taxation are characteristic of traditional or pre-capitalist states and their equivalents.

The means of taxation, and the uses to which the funds raised through taxation should be put, are a matter of often disputed in politics and economics, so discussions of taxation are frequently inconclusive.