Classical Greece

Athens heads the league of states, which pay it an annual fee to build ships and equip soldiers: the treasure of Delos. A cultured, intelligent and enterprising man will lead the destiny of Greece: Pericles. Pericles is credited with protecting the sciences and arts, carrying out exemplary reforms, and surrounding himself with effective collaborators. The newly conquered lands are distributed among the wage-earning peasants, and provisions are made to alleviate the poverty of large sectors of the population.

The Treasury is transferred from Delos to Athens. Pericles decides that it should not only be used for military purposes, but also for the construction of public buildings. The Parthenon, along with the Propylaea and the Erechtheion, beautifies the city, but also alleviates unemployment.

At the same time, the Athenians' sense of community made the Public Treasury a kind of common purse for distributing goods among the people. Wealthy citizens who attended the games during official festivals had to give two obols so that the poor could also enjoy the shows. And when this wasn't enough, the surplus from the state budget each year was distributed.

These distributions, and the Parthenons that sprang up on all the acropolises of Greece, reduced public funds and left them without reserves for cases of need or for war expenses. On such occasions there was no choice but to establish direct taxes , which tax the income or assets of citizens.

It is worth noting that Athenian democracy did not consider direct taxes to be the only equitable ones, and so in times of peace it collected indirect taxes , such as those levied on the market and consumption. Customs duties never 2.5 , allowing all products from other countries to enter the newly built port of Piraeus.

These tax benefits did not exempt wealthy citizens from the obligation to finance choirs that participated in state-organized festivals, or to equip and maintain a combat ship in times of war.

No citizen should suffer hunger or misery, and the State paid for doctors and teachers. A salary was assigned to those who performed public functions.