School: The 16th Amendment & Me

"In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes." - Benjamin Franklin

If you ever want a visceral demonstration of how things can get a bit out of hand when it comes to legislation, take a tax class in law school. My Income Tax course supplement, for example, is about twice the size of any other textbook I've ever used. It's only a tiny snippet of the actual tax code, with lots of sections completely omitted, but it still spans thousands of pages, and it's still a PITA to carry around.

Keep in mind the Feds didn't regularly tax income until the 16th Amendment was ratified in 1913. Only a century later, we have today's tax code, which is way too big to fit in one book (even just the income tax sections). The tax code is continually changed and amended by legislators, so much so that you need a new edition of the supplement every year just to keep up.