I was just listening to the Beatles song 'Taxman', which George Harrison wrote to reflect the band's discontent with the high taxes they were paying. The song references the leaders of the two main UK political parties, Harold Wilson and Edward Heath of the Labour and Conservative Party respectively. But here is where I am confused. I assumed it was only the Labour Party who were championing high taxes at the time to fund the Welfare State model they started after WW2 and the Conservatives were not so heavy on high taxes but yet, Edward Heath's name is also referenced as part of the fictional 'Taxman' in the song?
So, why does the song reference both politicians if only one of them (Wilson) was responsible for the high taxes the Beatles were paying in the 1960s ?
This is my first contribution on this subreddit. I hope it meets the standards!
You're correct in saying that the direct lines of attack in the song (most specifically, "there's one for you, nineteen for me") are directed towards the newly-reelected Labour government of Harold Wilson. Steve Turner writes that in February of 1966, before the general election in March and the recording of Taxman in April, George said to Maureen Cleave in an interview:
"There he goes, [t]aking all the money and then moaning about deficits here, deficits there — always moaning about deficits.”
He also compared him to the Sheriff of Nottingham from Robin Hood.
Out of all the Beatles, George was the one with the most developed ideas on taxation. However, George wasn't against taxation or supporting the welfare state in general. There's a great exchange in an interview with Tom Lodge from Radio Caroline that Steve Turner puts in his book:
TL: Do you—do you have any ideas of—you like to change this country in any way?
JOHN: Yes, like to change it a lot.
TL: In what way?
JOHN: Well, the tax problem.
TL: What would you do with the tax?
JOHN: Well, I’d reduce it drastically.
TL: That’s if your—you were Chancellor of the Exchequer.
JOHN: No—if I was anybody. I’d reduce it. Drastically.
PAUL: Give the pop stars a fairer share of the country’s wealth!
TL: That—if you were in—in politics, that’s what you would do.
PAUL: Yes, and any boy that can swim like that ought to be in England’s team.
TL: What would you do if you were in politics, to help the country?
RINGO: Oh, I don’t know.
JOHN: Go on, tell ’em, Ringo. You know what you’d do.
RINGO: I don’t know, no!
PAUL: You’ve got a plan!
GEORGE: But they can’t—they can’t pull the—take the taxes down, ’cause they haven’t got enough money. And, uh, they’ll never have enough money while they’re buying all that crap like F-111s [a newly developed tactical fighter-bomber]. Harold! Which—they’ve proved they’re no use whatsoever ’cause we’re not all—y’know, what good’s all that? So if they pay off a few of the bloody debts—
RINGO:—steel industry—
GEORGE:—then maybe they’d be able to cut the tax down a little, Harold?
George was mainly annoyed that the high rate of taxation (95% for high earners like him) was being used to fund military purchases. This was during the Vietnam War and in the same interview with Maureen Cleave, George expressed anti-Vietnam War views.
The Beatles were also generally annoyed as their success had brought great financial wealth to the United Kingdom. Jonathan Gould writes:
By 1965 the group’s combined efforts were thought to be grossing something on the order of a hundred million dollars a year. And this counted only the commerce generated directly by the Beatles themselves. Even more significant for the British economy was the fact that the group had single-handedly created an export market in popular music where none had existed before. Moreover, by fanning the flames of pop Anglophilia in the United States, Europe, and parts of Asia, they had contributed significantly to the growth of Britain’s fashion, entertainment, and tourism industries.
Furthermore, Ian Macdonald explains that the Beatles (and others earning similar amounts as them) were wary about the re-election of the Labour government as they did not want to lose out on income during their peak years because of high taxation. However, as "stars with social scruples", it was difficult to attack taxes while sympathizing with the plight of the working class who the taxes were meant to protect. He writes:
Hence, the dig at Wilson in this Beatle ‘protest’ lyric, part-written by Lennon, is balanced by a conscience-saving (and controversy-evading) snipe at Conservative opposition leader Edward Heath.
In a footnote to that comment, Macdonald cites another example of a similar problem:
A similar dilemma was likewise skirted around by Ray Davies of The Kinks, who, in ‘Sunny Afternoon’, used a millionaire persona to complain about Harold Wilson’s deflationary clamp on credit (’Save me, save me, save me from this Squeeze’) before offsetting this with a Dickensian portrayal of urban poverty in the group’s follow-up single ‘Dead End Street’.
It's important to remember that three of the Beatles were working-class boys (George, Ringo, and Paul) while John was born into a working-class family but raised by his middle-class aunt. Ringo, if my memory is accurate, actually grew up below or close to the poverty line and received unemployment benefits in the mid-50s. However, I can't quite remember the details. Volume one Tune In of Mark Lewisohn's wonderful series The Beatles: All These Years goes over their youth in quite some detail.
I can't quite comment on whether the Conservative Party in the UK was anti-welfare state or whether they drastically lowered taxes in 1970 when they came into power. Someone with more knowledge of British political history could jump in on that! Hope this helps answer your question!
Sources:
Steve Turner: Beatles '66: The Revolutionary Year
Ian MacDonald: Revolution in the Head: The Beatles' Records and the Sixties
Jonathan Gould: Can't Buy Me Love: The Beatles, Britain and America
Mark Lewisohn: The Beatles: All These Years. Volume 1: Tune In