At National Review Online, Thomas A. Nugent writes:

 Ten angry Democratic presidential candidates are debating over how to further increase taxes on the electorate. Here's the list they want to lengthen (courtesy of one of my conservative cohorts):

Accounts Receivable Tax
Building Permit Tax
Capital Gains Tax
CDL License Tax
Cigarette Tax
Corporate Income Tax
Court Fines (indirect taxes)
Dog License Tax
Federal Income Tax

...[a lengthy list of taxes follows]...

Watercraft Registration Tax
Well Permit Tax
Workers Compensation Tax

Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago when our nation was the most prosperous in the world, had absolutely no national debt, and had the largest middle class in the world.

What the hell happened?

What happened is that we did a lot in the last century to eliminate living conditions like these:

Most occupations required sixty hour or longer work weeks, paid poorly, and in many cases required difficult and dangerous labor. For example many workers in the stockyards had to work 10 hour days, six days a week standing in cold water.

Employers hired and paid on a weekly or daily basis and often shut down for several months of the year due to weather or lack of business. When the employer shut down, or a worker was sick, the worker did not get paid...various sources reported that the typical laborer spent at least several months of the year unemployed and without income.

In order to get by, it was often necessary for all family members to work, often even young children. It was also very common to take in lodgers or boarders even in a rented two room tenement. In slum districts some people even housed horses in the basements, or slept in stables. Otherwise unemployed family members often resorted to small-scale and poorly paying businesses such as fruit peddling.

To a white-collar Republican like Mr. Nugent, of course, that sounds like paradise.

(Thanks to TAPPED, which points out that in 1903 we actually had a significant national debt, an infant mortality rate of 10%, and black life expectancy of 33 years.)