Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-4rdpn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-13T00:46:13.641Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Russia's First Income Taxes: The Effects of Modernized Taxes on Commerce and Industry, 1885- 1914

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Linda Bowman
Linda Bowman*
Affiliation:
Department of History, Univesity College, University of New South Wales
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

And if they have anything, they conceal all they can … as men are wont to do where they are in fear of foreign invasion. …

Giles Fletcher, Of the Rus Commonwealth

Everyone knows that tax inspectors are monsters.

Mikhail Bulgakov, The White Guard.

During the last three decades of the tsarist regime the business tax system became the experimental vanguard of the entire tax structure. Thirty-one years before a general income tax on all estates (sosloviia) was confirmed in April 1916, Russia's first permanent income taxes on business were imposed in January 1885.

Type
Articles
Information
Slavic Review , Volume 52 , Issue 2 , Summer 1993 , pp. 256 - 282
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1993

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

I would like to thank David Christian, Hans Rogger, Lewis Siegelbaum, Elizabeth Waters and the anonymous readers for their invaluable comments. I would also like to thank Thomas Owen for suggesting some very helpful sources.

1. Ill Polnoe sobranie zakonov Rossiiskoi imperii (hereafter PSZ) V, 15 January 1885, no. 2,664: “Regulations concerning the taxation of commercial and industrial enterprises by supplementary levies (percentage and repartitional). ”

2. In 1824 Igor’ Kankrin (minister of finance, 1823-1844) introduced the patent system whereby merchants paid a fixed annual sum to the government in exchange for a business license or certificate (svidetel'stvo) which allowed them to engage in a specified range of trades and industries. Purchase of a license also brought merchant estate status which entailed personal and juridical privileges (PSZ, XXXIX, 14 November 1824, no. 30115). See also Ryndziunskii, P. G., “Gil'deiskaia reforma Kankrina 1824 goda” htoricheskie zapiski 40 (1952): 110-39Google Scholar.

3. From 1812 to 1819 an income tax on noble land (excluding crown and royal estates) was collected in order to help pay off government loans incurred during the Napoleonic wars. Boldyrev, G. I., Podokhodnyi nalog na zapade i v Rossii (Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo severo-zapadnogo prombiuro V.S.N.Kh., 1924), 170Google Scholar.

4. Ill PSZ, XVIII, 8 June 1898, no. 15,601.

5. A general income tax system which taxed all classifications of capital and income was permanently established in England in 1842 (after a fitful start during the Napoleonic wars) and in Italy in 1864. In England there was no separate business tax but commercial-industrial income was declared separately in Schedule D of the tax return. Prussia established a mixture of repartitional and progressive income taxes levied on business in 1891. (Each of the old principalities of Germany had its own taxes.) Austria set up a corporate income tax and a tax on average profitability of noncorporate enterprises in 1896-1898. France, fiscally conservative, did not add an income-based element to its patent system of business taxation at this time. “Obshchii obzor zapadno-evropeiskikh sistem oblozheniia torgovli i promyslov,” Vestnik finansov, promyshlennosti i torgovli (hereafter Vestnik finansov), no. 20 (1898): 443-46; “Oblozhenie torgovli i promyslov v Italii,” Vestnik finansov, no. 17 (1898): 213-18; “Oblozhenie torgovli i promyslov v Anglii,” Vestnik finansov, no. 19 (1898): 372-76.

6. Zaionchkovsky, Peter A., The Russian Autocracy in Crisis, 1878-1882, ed. and trans. Hamburg, Gary M. (Gulf Breeze: Academic International Press, 1979), 273 Google Scholar; see also Nina I. Anan'ich, “K istorii otmeny podushnoi podati v Rossii,” Istoricheskie zapiski 94 (1974): 183-212.

7. The direct tax system targeted urban and business income: by increasing rates for urban property taxes (1883); and by introducing death duties and gift taxes (1882), a levy on interest-bearing deposits and securities (1885), business income taxes (1885) and an impost (1893) on revenue from urban house and apartment ownership (kvartirnyi nalog). Ministerstvo finansov, 1802-1902, 2 vols. (St. Petersburg: Ministerstvo finansov, 1904), 2: 121-46.

8. Nina I. Anan'ich, “Podatnye reformy pervoi poloviny 80-kh godov XIX v.” (Dissertation abstract, Leningrad State University, 1978), 18-19. Despite the implementation of income-based taxes after 1881, the Russian budget's reliance on direct taxes declined: in 1880 the proportion of direct taxes to indirect taxes was 3:7; in 1901 it was 1:5 ( Shvanebakh, P.Kh., Nashe podatnoe delo [St. Petersburg: M.M. Stasiulevich, 1903], 32 Google Scholar). Russia also continued to rely more heavily on indirect taxation than the other European powers: Percentages of direct and indirect taxation in 1911 Direct Indirect Russia 15.2 84.8 France 29.4 70.6 Petrograd, 1917), 132.

9. See A. Babkov, “National Finances and the Economic Evolution of Russia,” Russian Review 1, no. 3 (1912): 170-91; Gatrell, Peter, The Tsarist Economy, 1850-1917 (London: B.T. Batsford, 1986), 220–21Google Scholar; Crisp, Olga, Studies in the Russian Economy before 1914 (London: Macmillan, 1976), 27–28 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For works challenging the traditional view on the peasant tax burden, see: James Y. Siinms, “More Grist for the Mill: A Further Look at the Crisis in Russian Agriculture at the Find of the Nineteenth Century,” Slavic Review 50, no. 4 (1991): 999-1009; James Y. Simms, Jr., “The Crisis in Russian Agriculture at the End of the Nineteenth Century: A Different View,” Slavic Review 36, no. 3 (1977): 377-98; and Gregory, Paul R., Russian National Income, 1885-1913 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1982)Google Scholar.

10. A. Babkov, “National Finances,” 190.

11. Sergei Witte, “An FLconomic Policy for the Empire,” in Riha, Thomas, ed.. Readings in Russian Civilization (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1964), 2: 416–29Google Scholar.

12. The Department of Trade and Manufacture, assessing the accuracy of the statistics on business turnover and profits collected in conjunction with the repartitional tax, concluded that since “everywhere solidarity of private interests of taxpayers [prevailed], reduced figures of defined turnover and profits ought to be seen not only as universal but also everywhere more or less equal…. ” (Statisticheskie rezul'taty protsentnogo i raskladochnogo sborov za 1889 god [St. Petersburg: V. Kirshbaum, 1892], v; hereafter Statisticheskie rezul'taty 1889.)

13. David Christian has pointed out to me that tax cheating in the area of liquor excises late in the nineteenth century reached the heights of high-tech tax fraud because distillers had to tamper with the machines installed in their distilleries to measure the amounts of spirit they produced. In the excise department they were acutely conscious as early as the 1860s of the need to reduce fraud by paying tax collectors enough to make bribes less tempting, by selecting them very strictly and demanding high educational qualifications. See Christian, David, Living Water: Vodka and Russian Society on the Eve of Emancipation (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990), 313 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

14. K.G., “Nalogovyia izdevatel'stva,” Promyshlennost’ i torgovlia, no. 20 (15 October 1910): 407.

15. See Ardant, Gabriel, Theorie sociologique de I'impot (Paris: SEVPEN, 1965)Google Scholar and Owen, Thomas C., “The Population Ecology of Corporations in the Russian Empire, 1700-1914” Slavic Review 50, no. 4 (1991): 822Google Scholar.

16. The term “corporation” in this article encompasses both “joint-stock companies” (aktsionernoe obshchestvo or aktsionernaia kompaniia) and “share partnerships” (tovarishchestvo na paiakh). The typical features of a joint stock company included: a relatively large capitalization; a cheaply-priced share, called an aktsiia, the median price of which ranged from 100 to 500 rubles; and a large number of shareholders. Share partnerships were usually smaller in size than joint-stock companies and were often established to provide limited liability for an existing family enterprise such as a cotton textile factory. The price of a share, called a pai, was high (between 500 and 25,000 rubles; median price was 1,000 rubles). Shares were most often distributed to a small circle of the partners’ relatives and friends. Both had an imperial charter and were required to publish their balance sheets ( Owen, Thomas C., The Corporation under Russian Law, 1800-1917: A Study in Tsarist Economic Policy [New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991], 12–13, 51CrossRefGoogle Scholar; “The Formation and Survival of Corporations in the Russian Empire, 1821-1914,” paper delivered to the Von Gremp Workshop in Economic History and the History of Entrepreneurship [University of California, Los Angeles, 14 February 1990], 17, 19).

17. Rudchenko, I.Ia., Istoricheskii ocherk oblozheniia torgovli i promyslov v Rossii (St. Petersburg: V. Kirshbaum, 1893), 282–354, esp. 303Google Scholar; Laverychev, V.Ia., Krupnaia burzhuaziia v poreformennoi Rossii, 1861-1900 (Moscow: Mysl', 1974), 36 Google Scholar; Ministerstvo finansov 2: 142. For an excellent discussion of the controversies, committee work and feeling of urgency preceding the introduction of the income taxes on business, see Nina I. Anan'ich, “K istorii podatnykh reform 1880-kh godov (Vvedenie dopolnitel'nykh sborov k promyslovomu nalogu: 3-protsentnogo i raskladochnogo),” Istoriia SSSR, no. 1 (1979): 159-73.

18. The corporate income tax was also extended to new businesses. For example in 1887 all credit institutions—whether privately or publicly owned, because both already published balance sheets annually—were subjected to the tax. Ill PSZ, VII, 21 December 1887, no. 4898.

19. In the 1898 business tax regulations, corporate profits (now defined as a proportion of nominal capital rather than as an absolute sum), ranging from 3 to 10% paid rates ranging from 3 to 6%. Profits exceeding 10% of nominal capital were also subject to a 5% “surcharge” (III PSZ, XVIII, 8 June 1898, no. 15,601: 504; Ministerstvo Finansov 2: 145). For an analysis of the social impact of the 1898 business tax reform on the kupechestvo as a result of the reform's loosening of the tie between estate membership and the conduct of business, see Bokhanov, A. N., “Rossiiskoe kupechestvo v kontse XlX-nachale XX veka” htoriia SSSR, no. 4 (1985): 106-18Google Scholar.

20. Shepelev, Leonid E., Tsarizm i burzhuaziia vo vtoroi polovine XIX veka. Problemy torgovo-promyshlennoi politiki (Leningrad: Nauka, 1981), 229 Google Scholar.

21. G.F. Semeniuk, “Moskovskaia tekstil'naia burzhuaziia i vopros o promyslovom naloge v 90-kh godakh XIX veka,” Moskovskii oblastnoi pedagogicheskii institut imeni N.K. Krupshoi. Uchenye zapiski. htoriia SSSR, 127 (1963): 159-69.

22. See footnote 85, “Izmenenie nekotorykh postanovlenii o gosudarstvennom promyslovom naloge,” Vestnik finansov, no. 5 (1906): 167.

23. Guild enterprises were substantial businesses, sufficiently well off to purchase a guild license and pay the various fees levied on members of the guild kupechestvo. The first guild was most prestigious and members were permitted a wide range of activities, including exclusive rights to wholesale trade, banking and insurance operations; in fact corporations, banks and insurance companies were required to take a first guild license. Second guild merchants were permitted local retail trade. Members of either guild could run factories with more than sixteen workers. Smaller traders and artisans were obliged to take either a petty trade license or a meshchane business license, neither of which granted privileges of the merchant estate (kupechestvo). In 1889 the repartitional levy was extended to these smaller non-guild enterprises and in 1893 it was applied to excise-paying factories (II PSZ XXXVIII, 1 January 1863, no. 39,118; XL, 9 February 1865, no. 41,779; III PSZ, XVIII, 8June 1898, no. 15,601).

24. The institution of tax inspector was established on 30 April 1885. A further 60 tax inspectors were sent out in 1893 (Departament sborov, okladnykh, Departament okladnykh sborov, 1863-1913 [St. Petersburg: Ministerstvo Finansov, 1913], 101–3Google Scholar; Statisticheskie rezul'taty 1889, iv; III PSZ, V, 15 January 1885, no. 2664).

25. Statistika priamykh nalogov i poshlin. Gosudarstvennyi promyslovyi nalog. Osnovnoi nalog s otchetnykh i neotchetnykh predpriiatii i dopolnitel'nyi nalog s neotchetnykh predpriiatii za 1912 (Petrograd: P.P. Soikin, 1915), xv (hereafter Statistika priamykh nalogov i poshlin 1912).

26. Statisticheskie rezul'taty raskladochnogo sbora za 1885 god (St. Petersburg: V. Kirshbaum, 1888), iii-iv (hereafter Statisticheskie rezul'taty 1885).

27. Ibid., iv.

28. Statements for purposes of assessing the repartitional levy were to include information regarding type and location of the business, number of workers, tools of production employed, turnover for the past year and, if they wished, their profits! (P. Genzel, “Kratkoe issledovanie o promyslovom oblozhenii v Rossii,” Russkoe ekonomicheskoe obozrenie, no. 3 [1900]: 98, 102).

29. In 1893 there were 432 corporations operating in Russia and by 1900 there were over 1,000, an increase which Carstensen attributes mainly to the realization by “many businessmen” that “a fixed, flat rate of taxation on corporate profits was preferable to this uncertain but relentlessly growing apportioned [repartitional] tax” (Fred V. Carstensen, “Foreign Participation in Russian Economic Life: Notes on British Enterprise 1865-1914,” in Guroff, Gregory and Carstensen, Fred V., eds., Entrepreneurship in Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983], 144)Google Scholar.

30. Until the business tax reform of 1898, in which “net profit” was more clearly defined, only the inadequate Ministry of Finance Instructions of 28 July 1885 and 24 February 1888 gave some help to tax officials and business ( “Dopolnitel'nyi protsentnyi sbor v nashei sisteme promyslovogo oblozheniia,” Vestnik finansov, no. 24 [1898]: 680).

31. Semeniuk, “Moskovskaia tekstil'naia burzhuaziia,” 156.

32. Aida M. Solov'eva, “Pribyli krupnoi promyshlennoi burzhuazii v aktsionernykh obshchestvakh Rossii v kontse XlX-nachale XX veka,” Istoriia SSSR, no. 3 (1984): 37.

33. Semeniuk, “Moskovskaia tekstil'naia burzhuaziia,” 156.

34. Statistika priamykh nalogov i poshlin 1912, xxix.

35. V.V. Galakhov, “Nekotorye voprosy izucheniia statisticheskikh materialov promyslovogo oblozheniia. 1885-1898 gg.,” htoricheskie zapiski 109 (1983): 246; “Dopolnitel'nyi raskladochnyi sbor v nashei sisteme promyslovago oblozheniia,” Vestnik finansov, no. 25 (1898): 727.

36. Blagoveshchenskii, N. A., “O dopolnitel'nom raskladochnom sbore s gil'deiskikh predpriiatii” Ekonomicheskii zhurnal (March 1888): 6Google Scholar.

37. Galakhov, “Nekotorye voprosy,” 243-44.

38. Statistika priamyhh nalogov i poshlin 1912, xxviii

39. Statisticheskie rezul'taty 1885, v-vi.

40. Statisticheskie rezul'taty raskladochnogo i trekhprotsentnogo sborov za 1886 god (St. Petersburg: V. Kirshbaum, 1888), xxvi.

41. See Baxt, Robert, Gelski, Richard, Grbich, Yuri, Marks, Bernard and Pose, Kevin, Cases and Materials on Taxation, 2nd ed. (Sydney: Butterworths, 1988), 869–71Google Scholar.

42. Deductions allowed by the 1885 regulations for the corporate income tax included: expenditures on improvements for the general welfare (building, hospitals, schools); costs of renting factories, mills and other industrial enterprises; costs for maintenance, repair, renewal and insurance of machines, instruments and other inventory; costs of fuel and lighting; damages and losses to income; interest paid on capital used for construction of the enterprise; government taxes, zemstvo and municipal levies. The regulations disallowed as deductions: expenditure on the maintenance of domestic offices, the owner's family and domestic servants; sums paid in the form of dividends, profits or interest to shareholders, founders, directors, managers and employees; depreciation of capital, buildings and machines; repayment of capital obligations and debts; gains (interest) from capital invested in the enterprise. For lack of a better model, the privately owned enterprises also used the guidelines published for corporations in their calculation of “net profits” ( Rudchenko, , Istoricheskii ocherk, 293–94Google Scholar).

43. Ozerov is quoted in Solov'eva, “Pribyli,” 46.

44. Genzel, P, “Kratkoe issledovanie o promyslovom oblozhenii v Rossii” Russkoe ekonomicheskoe obozrenie, no. 2 (1900): 126Google Scholar.

45. Solov'eva, “Pribyli,” 46. Emile Zundel immigrated from Alsace to Moscow, where he became a member of the French business “colony. ”

46. Revizionnaia komissiia—elected audit commission composed of shareholders not on the board, whose purpose was to examine the company's records, take an inventory of its property and present its findings to the annual general assembly | ( Owen, , Corporation, 21 Google Scholar).

47. Semeniuk, “Moskovskaia tekstil'naia burzhuaziia,” 151-52.

48. Ibid., 152-53.

49. Ill PSZ, XVIII, 8 June 1898, no. 15,601. In 1906 the income tax on corporate officials was made progressive, from 1 to 7% ( “Izmenenie nekotorykh postanovlenii o gosudarstvennom promyslovom naloge,” Vestnik finansov, no. 5 f 1906]: 170).

50. Solov'eva, “Pribyli,” 46.

51. Semeniuk, “Moskovskaia tekstil'naia burzhuaziia,” 153-54.

52. Buryshkin, Pavel A., Moskva kupecheskaia (New York: Chekhov Publishing Company, 1954), 113Google Scholar.

53. Semeniuk, “Moskovskaia tekstil'naia burzhuaziia,” 153-55.

54. Solov'eva, “Pribyli,” 38.

55. Ibid., 38-39.

56. See Carstensen, Fred V., American Enterprise in Foreign Markets: Studies of Singer and International Harvester in Imperial Russia (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1984)Google Scholar; “American Multinational Corporations in Imperial Russia: Chapters on Foreign Enterprise and Russian Economic Development” (Ph.D. dissertation, Yale University, 1976), 124-28, 275, 367-68; Leonid E. Shepelev, “Aktsionernoe uchreditel'stvo v Rossii,” Iz istorii imperializma v Rossii (Leningrad: Akademiia Nauk SSSR, 1973), 305, as cited in Carstensen, “Foreign Participation in Russian Economic Life,” 145.

57. Statisticheskie rezul'taty 1889, v.

58. Galakhov, “Nekotorye voprosy,” 244.

59. Before the 1898 tax reform, the first line of appeal for corporations was the provincial tax office which then sent its decisions to the governor. At this stage, either the governor or the corporation itself could make further appeals through the Department of Trade and Manufacture. The final court of appeal was the Senate. Payers of the repartitional tax could lodge objections with the local tax office which sent its decision on to the provincial office. After 1898 attempts were made to free the Department of Trade and Manufacture from the enormous task of dealing with appeals and complaints. Evidently two thirds of the work of the Finance Ministry concerned examination of appeals. Special appeal offices (sudebno-administrativnoe prisutsvie) were set up in each province and oblast to take over the workload ( “Uchrezhdeniia, zavedyvaiushchie gosudarstvennym promyslovym nalogom,” Vestnik finansov, no. 32 [1898]: 184-85; Statistika priamykh nalogov iposhlin 1912, xxix; “Dopolnitel'nyi protsentnyi sbor v nashei sisteme promyslovogo oblozheniia,” Vestnik finansov, no. 24 [1898]: 679; “Dopolnitel'nyi raskladochnyi sbor v nashei sisteme promyslovogo oblozheniia,” Vestnik finansov, no. 25 [1898]: 725; Departament Okladnykh sborov, Otdeleniia po promyslovomu nalogu [title page missing], 28 September 1909, no. 10312 [St. Petersburg, 1909], 57; Rudchenko, , Istoricheskii ocherk” Prilozhenie,” 78Google Scholar).

60. Galakhov, “Nekotorye voprosy,” 244, 259.

61. K.G., “Nalogovyia izdevatel'stva,” 407.

62. Statistika priamykh nalogov i poshlin 1912, xxix.

63. Semeniuk, “Moskovskaia tekstil'naia burzhuaziia,” 165, 168

64. S” ezd podatnykh inspektorov Minskoi gubernii (Minsk, 1896), 63.

65. Blagoveshchenskii, “O dopolnitel'nom raskladochnom sbore,” 5-6.

66. Ibid., 5.

67. “Uchrezhdeniia, zavedyvaiushchie gosudarstvennym promyslovym nalogom,” Vestnik jinansov, no. 32 (1898): 186.

68. K.G., “Nalogovyia izdevatel'stva,” 407.

69. Owen, Thomas C., Capitalism and Politics in Russia: A Social History of the Moscow Merchants, 1855-1905 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 103Google Scholar; Rieber, Alfred J., Merchants and Entrepreneurs in Imperial Russia (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1982), 56–62 Google Scholar.

70. Genzel, P, “Kratkoe issledovanie o promyslovom oblozhenie v Rossii” Russkoe ekonomicheskoe obozrenie, no. 3 (1900): 91-93Google Scholar.

71. Ill PSZ, 21 December 1887, no. 4898, see article 6, 505; Rudchenko, , Istoricheskii ocherk, 326 Google Scholar.

72. S “ezd podatnykh inspektorov Minskoi gubernii, 60.

73. Ezhegodnik Ministerstva Finansov (1888): 178.

74. “Nalog na predprinimatel'skuiu pribyl’ v Rossii,” Ekonomicheskii zhurnal (April 1885): 20.

75. Ezhegodnik Ministerstva Finansov (1888): 190.

76. Ibid. (1900): 222; (1902): 71.

77. Ibid. (1888): 192. In 1895, 63% of the companies subject to the corporate income tax were classified as “trade” establishments but more than 65% of these were credit organizations (Statisticheskie rezul'taty protsentnogo i raskladochnogo sborov za 1893, 1894 i 1895 gody [St. Petersburg: V. Kirshbaum, 1898], ii).

78. Statistika priamykh nalogov i poshlin 1912, xv.

79. Ezhegodnik Ministerstva Finansov (1888): 178; “Obshchii obzor finansovye rezul'taty nashei sistemy promyslovogo oblozheniia,” Vestnik finansov, no. 26 (1898): 776-77; Semeniuk, “Moskovskaia tekstil'naia burzhuaziia,” 169; Khromov, P. A., Ekonomicheskoe razvitie Rossii v XIXXX vekakh, 1800-1917 (Moscow: Gosudarnoe izdatel'stvo politicheskoi literatury, 1950), 499 Google Scholar.

80. Genzel, P, “Kratkoe issledovanie o promyslovom oblozhenie v Rossii” Russkoe ekonomicheskoe obozrenie, no. 1 (1900): 55Google Scholar.

81. Semeniuk, “Moskovskaia tekstil'naia burzhuaziia,” 150.

82. Paul Gregory estimates that for the period 1883-1887, industry (construction, transportation, communication, factory and handicraft) contributed 23.4% of the national income, a figure which rose to 30.6% in 1897-1901. Trade and services (including government and domestic service) declined somewhat, from 19.2% in 1883-1887 to 18.1% in 1897-1901. Trade, services and industry together grew from 42.6 to 48.7% between the mid-1880s and the turn of the century ( Gregory, , Russian National Income, 132–36Google Scholar).

83. For government business tax receipts, see: Vladimir, Potekhin, “O gil'deiskom sbore v Rossii” Promyshlennost1 3, no. 15 (1861): 263-64Google Scholar; Khromov, , Ekonomicheskoe razvitie Rossii, 444–511 Google Scholar; Ministerstva Finansov, 1: 616-35, 2: 640-47; Michelson, A. M., Russian Public Finance during the War. Revenue and Expenditures (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1928), 123 Google Scholar.

84. Figures for annual growth of industry and trade and services during the period 1885/1887-1897/1901 are taken from Gregory, , Russian National Income, 133 Google Scholar.

85. The legislation of 2 January 1906 made the following changes to corporate taxation: the tax on corporate capital was increased from 0.15 to 0.2%; the corporate income tax progressive scale was made steeper, culminating in a 14% tax from profits of 19-20% (as a proportion of capital); and in addition to the 5% surcharge from profits exceeding 10% (introduced in 1898), a further 10% was skimmed off profits exceeding 20%. For enterprises paying the repartitional levy, the excess profits tax (also implemented in 1898), was raised from 3.33 to 5%. From 1906 corporate officials paid a progressive income tax ranging from 1 to 7% rather than the flat 2% introduced in 1898 (Departament Okladnykh Sborov, Otdeleniia po promyslovomu nalogu [title page missing], no. 10312 [St. Petersburg, 1909], 25-26; “Izmenenie nekotorykh postanovlenii o gosudarstvennom promyslovom naloge,” Vestnikfinansov, no. 5 [1906]: 166-70; Linda Bowman, “Taxation in Pre-Revolutionary Russia,” Modern Encyclopedia of Russian and Soviet History [Supplement], ed. Joseph L. Wieczynski [Gulf Breeze: Academic International Press, 1991]).

86. Business tax growth rates were calculated from data in: Potekhin, Vladimir, “O gil'deiskom shore v Rossii” Promyshlennost’ 3, no. 15 (1861): 263-64Google Scholar; Khromov, , Ekonomicheskoe razvitie Rossii, 444–511 Google Scholar; Ministerstvo Finansov, 1: 615-35, 2: 640-47; Michelson, , Russian Public Finance during the War, 123 Google Scholar.

87. Falkus, Malcolm E., The Industrialization of Russia, 1700-1914 (New York: Macmillan, 1972), 79 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Khromov, , Ekonomicheskoe razvitie Rossii, 502–7Google Scholar.

88. Zapiska Soveta S “ezdov Predstavitelei Promyshlennosti i Torgovli po povodu vnesennago Ministerstvom Finansov v Gosudarstvennuiu Dumu predstavleniia o prodlenii deistviia zakona 2 ianvaria 1906 goda ob izmenenii nekotorykh postanovlenii o gosudarstvennom promyslovom naloge (St. Petersburg, 1907), 9-10.

89. Statisticheskie materialy k proektu ob izmenenii Polozheniia o Gosudarstvennom promyslovom naloge (St. Petersburg: Ministerstvo Finansov, 1909), 85, 101.

90. Shepelev, L. E., Tsarizm i burzhuaziia v 1904-1914 gg. Problemy torgovo-promyshlennoi politiki (Leningrad: Nauka, 1987), 220Google Scholar.

91. Babkov, “National Finances,” 180; Gatrell, , The Tsarist Economy, 218, 220Google Scholar.

92. Vsevolodov, A, “Nashi gosudarstvennye dokhody nynche i 50 let nazad” Promyshlennost’ i Torgovlia, no. 21 (1 November 1913): 393-94Google Scholar.

93. Babkov, “National Finances,” 191.

94. On the Riabushinskii company's tax avoidance tactics, see Semeniuk, “Moskovskaia tekstil'naia burzhuaziia,” 155. Regarding the liberal political activities of Pavel P. Riabushinskii, see James L. West, “The Riabushinsky Circle: Burzhuaziia and ohshchestvennost’ in Late Imperial Russia,” in Edith W. Clowes, Samuel D. Kassow and James L. West, eds., Between Tsar and People: Educated Society and the Quest for Public Identity in Late Imperial Russia (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), 41–56 Google Scholar.

95. Owen, , Capitalism and Politics, 198, 204Google Scholar.

96. West, “The Riabushinsky Circle,” 48.

97. Not only landowners objected to the income tax but also industrialists, who opposed its application to corporations. The income tax project under consideration by the Duma continued, in the eyes of the industrialists, to protect gentry interests to such an extent that 32.4% of the proposed general income tax was to come from commercial-industrial sources, 15.6% from land ( “Podokhodnyi nalog i Gosudarstvennaia Duma,” Finansovoe obozrenie, no. 30-31 [14 December 1910]: 9; Gorlin, Robert H., “Problems of Tax Reform in Imperial Russia” Journal of Modern History 49, no. 2 [1977]: 246-65Google Scholar).

98. Gorlin, “Tax Reform,” 265.

99. Anan'ich, “K istorii otmeny podushnoi podati,” 187.