The Terrific Engine

Download or read book The Terrific Engine written by David Tough and published by UBC Press. This book was released on 2018-05-15 with total page 199 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What do we mean by left wing or right wing? People started using the language of a political spectrum when early twentieth-century political parties began to distinguish their platforms by offering different approaches to income distribution. The Terrific Engine examines how the powerful tool of income taxation transformed the way people talk and think about politics in Canada. Drawing on heated debates that demonstrated the imaginative power of income taxation, David Tough traces the modernization of political language from the 1911 election through the Second World War. Countering a strongly held myth that income taxation was imposed on a reluctant public, Tough argues that its introduction is in fact a story of democracy. People first demanded that this new form of taxation replace existing ones, and then that it be used to address income inequality. And, in establishing a clear basis for party differences, income taxation made elections significantly more democratic.