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Here’s an idea. Let’s relieve Greece of its economic woes by levying a classical culture tax on all the rest of us.

Where would philosophy be without Socrates, Plato and Aristotle? Government without Pericles, Aspasia and Demosthenes? Physics without Archimedes? Poetry without Homer? Drama (and psychoanalysis) without Sophocles and Aristophanes? Medicine without Galen?

John Bowers

This article appears in Sep 29 – Oct 5, 2011.

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Tax The Smart

by Source Weekly, The Source - Bend, Oregon
September 29, 2011

<h1>Tax The Smart</h1> <p class="byline">by Source Weekly, The Source - Bend, Oregon <br />September 29, 2011</p> <p>Here's an idea. Let's relieve Greece of its economic woes by levying a classical culture tax on all the rest of us.</p> <p>Where would philosophy be without Socrates, Plato and Aristotle? Government without Pericles, Aspasia and Demosthenes? Physics without Archimedes? Poetry without Homer? Drama (and psychoanalysis) without Sophocles and Aristophanes? Medicine without Galen?</p> <p>John Bowers</p> <p>This &lt;a target=&quot;_blank&quot; href=&quot;https://www.bendsource.com/opinion/tax-the-smart-2139201/&quot;&gt;article&lt;/a&gt; first appeared on &lt;a target=&quot;_blank&quot; href=&quot;https://www.bendsource.com&quot;&gt;The Source - Bend, Oregon&lt;/a&gt; and is republished here under a &lt;a target=&quot;_blank&quot; href=&quot;https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/&quot;&gt;Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;img src=&quot;https://i0.wp.com/www.bendsource.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/cropped-Untitled-design-4.png?resize=150%2C150&amp;amp;ssl=1&quot; style=&quot;width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;&quot;&gt;</p> &lt;img id=&quot;republication-tracker-tool-source&quot; src=&quot;https://www.bendsource.com/?republication-pixel=true&amp;post=15582&quot; style=&quot;width:1px;height:1px;&quot;&gt;&lt;script&gt; PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: &quot;https://www.bendsource.com/opinion/tax-the-smart-2139201/&quot;, urlref: window.location.href }); } } &lt;/script&gt; &lt;script id=&quot;parsely-cfg&quot; src=&quot;//cdn.parsely.com/keys/bendsource.com/p.js&quot;&gt;&lt;/script&gt;

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