Filing a federal tax return is an ingrained habit now, but most middle-class Americans didn’t have to before World War II. The Revenue Act of 1942 made 15 million more people eligible to pay taxes. How could the government explain this to the masses? Cartoons! The U.S. Treasury department commissioned Disney to make a short animated film that explained how to fill out a simple tax return, and why paying income taxes was so important. (Spoiler alert: Defeating the Axis powers.) [More]
