Vox Clamantis in Deserto: The Role of the Individual in Forging a Strong Duty to the Tax System
The United States is blessed with a prevailing social norm of high tax compliance. However, a number of strong forces are currently placing that norm in jeopardy. This essay reviews the process by which social norms change and the characteristics evidenced by “contagious” social norms. It then considers the important role individual action can plays in creating and maintaining a social norm of tax compliance and how individuals can be encouraged to embrace and propagate this norm. Particular emphasis is placed on 1) ways that a taxpaying social norm can be molded to make it more contagious among individuals and 2) the means of coopting important trendsetter groups into supporting the norm.
Reconsidering the Nondelegation Doctrine: Universal Service, the Power to Tax, and the Ratification Doctrine
Nothing raises the blood pressure of average Americans more than taxes-a common aphorism has it that few things in life are certain, save death and taxes. Moreover, concerns about taxation (at least in part) sparked the American Revolution. 3 From the Boston Tea Party, in December 1773, to the California property tax revolt leading to the passage of Proposition 13 a little over two hundred years later in 1978, 4 to the present, U.S. taxpayers have proven remarkably resistant to involuntarily surrendering their property to the government. Taxes may well be the price that we pay
Negotiating the cultural and economic outcomes of sport heritage attractions: the case of the National Baseball Hall of Fame
ABSTRACT Contemporary museums must balance their roles as commercial entities and repositories of various, and often dissonant, heritages and histories. Sports museums in particular often have clear commercial and nostalgic aims, particularly through tourist visitation, though the extent to which they represent more challenging narratives remains unclear. This paper examines how one of the most famous sports museums in the world, the National Baseball Hall of Fame (NBHF) in Cooperstown, New York, balances its dual role as tourist attraction and repository of baseball's sometimes checkered past. It was found that different sections of the museum provide greater or lesser degrees of engagement with more controversial issues, although the commercial outputs and appeal of the museum remains clear throughout. Utlimately, the NBHF demonstrates that balancing veneration and critique in collections can be commercially prosperous, and can provide a template for other sport and popular culture museums who may be wary of incorporating more challenging narratives in their exhibits. Furthermore, the symbiotic relationship between the Hall of Fame and the village of Cooperstown, particularly in creating and maintaining cultural and economic outputs, requires further exploration.