ABILITY-TO-PAY PRINCIPLE: A principle of taxation in which taxes are based on the income or resource-ownership ability of people to pay the tax. The income tax collected by our friends at the Internal Revenue Service is one of the most common taxes that seeks to abide by the ability-to-pay principle. In theory, the income tax system is set up such that people with greater incomes pay more taxes. Proportional and progressive taxes follow this ability-to-pay principle, while regressive taxes, such as sales taxes and Social Security taxes, don't.

     See also | benefit principle | tax | income | public goods | progressive tax | regressive tax | proportional tax | circular flow |

ABILITY-TO-PAY PRINCIPLE, AmosWEB GLOSS*arama, http://www.AmosWEB.com, AmosWEB LLC, 2000-2025. [Accessed: July 11, 2025].

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The general elasticity relation in which relatively large changes in price cause relatively small changes in quantity demanded. Large changes in price cause relatively small changes in quantity demanded or the percentage change in quantity demanded is smaller than the percentage change in price. This characterization of elasticity is most important for the price elasticity of demand. Inelastic demand is one of two general elasticity relations for demand. The other is elastic demand.

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