An interview with Vanessa Williamson from Heather Cox Richardson. An opinion to consider as our Republicans in the NC Legislature continue to talk about ending some taxes in NC.

Heather Cox Richardson – “Yesterday, I had the chance to speak with Dr. Vanessa Williamson of the Brookings Institution about the relationship between taxes and democracy. I sought her out because I thought the ideas in her 2025 book, The Price of Democracy: The Revolutionary Power of Taxation in American History are a great companion to my conversation with Dr. Timothy Snyder about the difference between freedom FROM and freedom TO.

Our conversation was all that I had hoped and more. I’m calling attention to it because her explanation of taxation, democracy, power, and accountability strikes me as something that should be on far more radar screens than it is.”

Vanessa Williamson is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at Brookings, and a senior fellow at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. She studies taxation and democracy in America. Her new book, “The Price of Democracy,” reveals the revolutionary power of taxation in American history. She has written on school segregation, tax opinion, and tax politics in the Washington Post; about the Tea Party, anti-union legislation and voter registration at income tax filing in the New York Times; about taxpayer citizenship in the Atlantic; about philanthropy and austerity and white supremacy in Dissent; and about democracy and organizing for Teen Vogue.