How do Wizards pay taxes?

[Irda Ranger]

Inpired by the Taxes & Tithes Thread


How would you, as a King of Fantasy land, go about collecting taxes from Wizards and Sorcerer?

Traditionally, in Feudal Europe, taxes were paid with goods and services. You're a baker? You owe 13 loaves (Hence the phrase, a baker's dozen). You're a mason? Two weeks each season you repair walls at the castle, etc.

Wouldn't Wizards be the same? I was thinking about the Arcane Order's Spellpool in Tome & Blood. How about a National Spellpool, and your taxes are that at the end of each day you have to cast spells into the Kingdom's pool. Those are your taxes.

Now I have heard of tax rates as high as 50% during peacetime for the peasantry. Imagine that Wizards and Sorcerers only payed 25%. i.e. each day they cast up to 1/4 of their spells/ day into the National Spellpool.

Hmm ... D&D statistics suggest that 1 in 100 are spellcasters, but lets assume half of them are Divine, so we'll say 1 in 200. For a nation with 3 million total inhabitants, that's 15,000 Wizards and Sorcerers. That's almost 750 spell level/ DAY paid into the spell pool. 40 spell levels/ day from Wizards whose tax requirements would be equal to 4th level spells or higher (which are quite useful).

The Society of Royal Magicians (who would have unlimted "Admin" to this Spellpool) would then cast these spells on behalf of the King. 40 Walls of Stone/ day could pave a lot of road or build a Castle right quick. 40 Polymorph Others/ day could turn a team of Masons into Stone Giants (see my "Would you take a Polymorph for your Country?" Thread), which would also be quite cool from a "lets dig a new river channel, riiiiiiight, here!" POV.

Obviously, a Military that could throw more Fireballs/ day than the enemy would have quite an advantage.

What do you think of my Wizard's taxation?

Irda Ranger

 

[Crothian]

It could be in the spells, but I think cold hard cash would be the easiest way. I think one would need a national funding Mage Guild or other organization to really regulate Wizards and the taxes they should pay.

 

[Tonguez]

I read that Taxes and Tithes thread and thought the idea of a National Spellpool (and Spell tax) was interesting and quite usable in game

I'd say beyond this that Wizards pay taxes in magic item creation (yes every member of the royal guard has a +2 Magic Sword, and the King wears Force armour at all times!) and imagine having a potion of cure light wounds in every first aid kit

 

[Tonguez]

Of course we also have the issue of Adventurers coming back with all that load of gold and artifacts

Does the Local Sheriff ride forward with his guard (each with a +3 Crossbow thanks to the local Mages guild) and demand that 50% of the Loot and all Artifacts of Religious or Historic significance be handed over?

 

[Taloras]

Heres an idea. Wizards with various Craft feats could either
a. pay the required spell levels per day (as you originally said)
b. instead of simply making items for the country (and having to use up a huge amount of their own cash and XP) whenever needed, they make them at %75 base cost (so if its listed at 5000 market price, base cost is 2500, they make them for 1875). The 25% of the base cost is their taxes.

 

[Irda Ranger]

Crothian – I would have to disagree. Gold is a finite and material resource. Labor is the ultimate “renewable” resource. It doesn’t cost a Wiz anything to cast his spells into the pool, other than a few minutes of his time (and, of course, the opportunity to cast those spells elsewhere), whereas gold costs him what it costs him. Think about, you’re a Wizard. Would you rather part with your hard earned money, or spend 10 minutes casting your spells into the pool for one day’s worth, and be paid up for the week?

Tonguez – Regarding the +2 sword for every fighter, or the +3 crossbow for every tax collector. That would take a seriously wealthy nation. For the cost one +2 sword, for one guard, you could outfit an entire regiment with MW weapons. From a bang for buck ratio I think that would be much more sensible. The only way it would make sense for the guards to have +2 swords is if the cost of labor exceeds the cost of magical items, and it becomes the guards/ tax collector’s salary that costs more than the weapons would, over say 10 years. (Sorry, that’s what I get for being an Economics major)

If I wanted to collect taxes from the PCs, I would threaten them with city guards. I mean they’re PCs for Christ’s sake. They killed Ogres and Trolls for that gold, you think they’re gonna back down from a fight now? No, I would put a lien on their castle and seize all their assets until they pay up back taxes. Especially those items that aren’t “random”, they were stolen from the King by the Ogres, and now the King wants ‘em back. No, you’re not getting paid. It’s a service to your country.

Taloras – If I needed magical items, yes that’s how I would do it. Now the “Expert Crafter” feat, or whatever its name, is a real Financial investment, since you can underbid the competition.

Irda Ranger

 

[Crothian]

Crothian – I would have to disagree. Gold is a finite and material resource. Labor is the ultimate “renewable” resource. It doesn’t cost a Wiz anything to cast his spells into the pool, other than a few minutes of his time (and, of course, the opportunity to cast those spells elsewhere), whereas gold costs him what it costs him. Think about, you’re a Wizard. Would you rather part with your hard earned money, or spend 10 minutes casting your spells into the pool for one day’s worth, and be paid up for the week?

It's not what is most convient for the Wizard. Taxes don't care what is convient for you, they are what they are. I'm saying that a national spell pool is not something most kingdoms are going to have. I've yet to read about anyone having this type of thing in their campaign. It could happen, but you need an infastructure of wizards, and abilities for the wizards sopell pool to really help the kingdom.

 

[William Ronald]

While this is an interesting idea, it has some problems. First, I have not seen anything like this done in any fantasy novel, and it seems to detract a little from magic to make it just be another item on the Royal Accountant's ledger.

Also, there comes the question of exemptions. Is someone out of the country exempt from the tax? What about a spell caster who is serving either the national or local government.

In some campaigns, spell casters may well be rarer than 1 out of every 100 people. Especially in non-urban settings, it may be hard to find an arcane caster.

I just find it easier to deal with taxes, or having spell casters asked to perform a service for their local and national governments. Most characters will do so, just to gain or keep some good will from the politically powerful.

 

[Celebrim]

This is really to broad of a question to be answered in any definitive way:

Probably the only universal answer would be, Wizards, like everyone else, are charged as high of tax as the tax collectors dare.

In the case of Wizards this may not be very much.

I envision that in some societies, Wizards would be exempt from direct taxation, either because in practice you could not collect taxes profitably from wizards that didn't want to pay them, or because it was worth it to keep Wizards welcome in your nation at all costs.

In others, Wizards could be feared and distrusted and saddled with every sort of inconveince that the rulers could think of.

Taxation was rarely in the form of coin in the middle ages. Peasants were more often taxed in corn (grain), livestock, wood, labor, military service, trade goods, shingles, staves, cloth, and whatever else the liege lord thought the peasants might produce. Wizards are more likely to have coin that peasants, but I imagine that the barter economy would remain true in some areas (not in any areas of published D&D worlds mind you, were coins tend to accumulate under every rock and in every old leather pouch). Wizards could be taxed in labor (a certain number of spells per year), military service (a certain number of days per year), or production of magical goods.

Often as not though, I'd expect lords to want to cultivate relationships with Wizards, and keep notable ones on retainer at court as advisors. I don't expect that overall, wizards would be that highly taxed per-se, but rather that they would be encouraged subtly and otherwise to contribute to the community both by the Lords, and by the treat of lynch mobs of angery peasantry intent on putting them to the stake for practicing witchcraft, demonology, necromancy, trickery, and mesmerism.

 

[BMF]

You're a baker? You owe 13 loaves (Hence the phrase, a baker's dozen

err.... I might be wrong but I thought a "baker's dozen" being 13 is because he bakes 12 to have 1 dozen (of whatever, for whatever reason). While he's at it, he bakes 1 more for himself. Thus a baker's dozen is 13.

As for collecting taxes from wizards, I have no idea.