SPECIAL AND ADDITIONAL TAXES FOR URBAN POPULATION IN THE SOUTH OF UKRAINE IN 1870–1917s

Abstract

The study examines the peculiarities of taxation for urban population in the South of Ukraine in 1870–1917s, within the administrative and territorial structure. The introduction of the basic materials starts with the implementation of the City reform in 1870 in the Southern Ukrainian towns which determined main principles of decentralized self-government. Main attention of the paper is paid to the special and additional taxes for urban population, because they were not a subject of special researches on urban topics, but still they had an impact on a city community and activities of town self-government structures. 16 taxes from the list of all the taxes paid by urban population were compulsory and 20 taxes were referred to special ones making approximately a half of the budget of each town in total. The most important special and additional taxes for urban population were the following: charges for trade and industrial documents and patents; for tavern business; special taxes for entrepreneurs; for all merchant and industrial certificates and cards on trade and industrial objects; for different patents on factories producing beverages and spirit or wine products; charges for certificates in justice courts; taxes on horses; notarial charge; customs charges and taxes on civil procedures; charges for auction sales of movable property; half-kopeck charges; anchor charges; taxes on entertainments; taxes on the theatre and others. Finally, the paper draws conclusions about the peculiarities of taxation of urban population in the South of Ukraine in the 1870–1917s. It presents calculations showing that additional and special taxes for urban population made it possible for local budgets to make almost half of their profits. The study makes proposals on further research on a similar topic.