ABSTRACT

This address was the sixth of a series of 17 presented by nationally known economists and business consultants before the Special Session for Business Executives sponsored by the Department of Economics and Business Administration of Westminster College, New Wilmington, Pennsylvania, during the year 1937–38. This speech is reflective of the broad range of knowledge that Willard had with respect to the management process and how that process was affected by government actions, especially in the field of taxation. Initially in the speech Willard discusses the social (or macro-economic) point of view with respect to business-government relationships and the impact of taxation on business. He then discusses the ethics of paying the minimum tax required and the types of tax problems confronting businessmen. He outlines a plan for revision of the tax system and points out the problems related to the differences between accounting income and taxable income. He suggests a unique way of taxing corporate profits to avoid double taxation, a method which since has been adopted to a limited extent in the tax treatment applicable to corporations. He argues for stability in the tax system and concludes with a list of suggestions to businessmen as to how they should operate in order to minimize their company’s tax burden. Most of the suggestions are as applicable in the 1980s as they were in the 1930s. In fact, if his suggestion that companies should educate their own workers in tax matters had been widely implemented, more pressure would have been exerted on Congress to achieve economy in government as a means of keeping the federal deficit in check.