Read on Twitter
We Muslims have a word for a wealth tax, we call it "zakat". The early Muslim state collected no income tax, but collected an annual wealth tax of 2.5% from those with total savings above a certain amount. https://twitter.com/PatrickRuffini/status/1088618891146919936
There was also a land use tax (5-10%) levied upon prized land (productive agricultural land, or prime urban land). Land ownership was seen as conditional, not absolute. Meanwhile natural resources (mining etc) were taxed at 20%.
At the same time there were no customs, no income taxes, no sales taxes, no price controls, and money was basically gold/silver, which meant the government couldn't inflate the money supply. The rulers were also expressly forbidden from levying any other taxes.
Also whenever the government collected more than it needed, the surplus was redistributed to the people, on a yearly basis. Rich people were also encouraged to establish charitable trusts to support mosques, schools, hospitals, traveler guesthouses, etc.
Each generation of Muslims saw it as a duty to increase the public charitable trust (or "waqf") system. "Waqf" properties were privately owned, but their profits are pledged for funding public projects.
Centuries later, a large percentage of land in major Muslim cities was owned by these charitable trusts. Rich people "building a hospital, then establishing a waqf income for it" is a very common sentence in Islamic history books.
Btw, these "waqf" properties were later confiscated by subsequent post-colonial regime elites, with the promise that the national state will provide even better welfare. Spoiler: It didn't.
Btw, it's been argued that this "waqf" public trust system saved the Muslim world during a very turbulent period, when cities changed hands often and there was a lot of political instability. Waqf-funded public welfare institutions = not dependent on the government.
