The reason for the VAT (in the USSR it was called a Turnover Tax. They’re the same thing but a VAT does not tax means of production) was how incredibly simple it was to administer. Tax fraud could be kept relatively low for any given level of administration if a VAT was used instead of an income tax, for example. Many modern governments do this today for the same reason.
The USSR was constantly in a struggle to build an effective administration (a good book on this is Origins of the Great Purges ) while fighting what we today would call Bullshit Jobs and local strongmen.
The reason for the VAT (in the USSR it was called a Turnover Tax. They’re the same thing but a VAT does not tax means of production) was how incredibly simple it was to administer. Tax fraud could be kept relatively low for any given level of administration if a VAT was used instead of an income tax, for example. Many modern governments do this today for the same reason.
The USSR was constantly in a struggle to build an effective administration (a good book on this is Origins of the Great Purges ) while fighting what we today would call Bullshit Jobs and local strongmen.
Yeah