The taxes are passed right on to the consumers by the manufacturers. In the costs of the products. And also, the costs of whatever else they can pass along, including the cost of advertizing. This is why the brand-name articles cost more than the generic, even when the product is the same. We're paying for their name recognition, which is purchased with the advertizing dollar.

Ask any drug company.

I used the word "tax" not for its dictionary definition, but for its overall meaning: costs added on by large entities (government or corportation) that are basically beyond the control of the average citizen/consumer except through remedies that involve purging: election and boycott.

Perhaps it would have been less "taxing" for the imagination if I had put the "word" in "quotes".

I see you dropped the discussion of program quality.

Very precisely--
Mary Anne