What brings this to mind is the news
(spoiler/warning!, political content...)

is the news of those IRS audits of two
people TFG didn't like.

Anyway, Asimov had a short story in, iirc,
one of the mystery monthlies (but given
he wrote in everywhere and was reprinted
in more places, etc., etc...) where one
of the key characters around the dinner
table was a tax inspector, and he made a
BIG POINT that objectivity (and doubly so,
the public belief.. ) of tax agencies
was critical in a civilized society.

Ring any bells with anyone? Thanks

_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dannyb@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]

In article <Pine.NEB.4.64.2207081856550.6394@panix2.panix.com>,
danny burstein <dannyb@panix.com> wrote:
>What brings this to mind is the news
>(spoiler/warning!, political content...)
>
>is the news of those IRS audits of two
>people TFG didn't like.
>
>Anyway, Asimov had a short story in, iirc,
>one of the mystery monthlies (but given
>he wrote in everywhere and was reprinted
>in more places, etc., etc...) where one
>of the key characters around the dinner
>table was a tax inspector, and he made a
>BIG POINT that objectivity (and doubly so,
>the public belief.. ) of tax agencies
>was critical in a civilized society.
>
>Ring any bells with anyone? Thanks
>

I don't know specifically, but if it was a mystery and the characters
were around a dinner table, it was a "Black Widowers" story and is
probably in one of the collections:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Widowers
--
columbiaclosings.com
What's not in Columbia anymore..

On Friday, July 8, 2022 at 2:57:47 PM UTC-4, danny burstein wrote:
> What brings this to mind is the news
> (spoiler/warning!, political content...)
>
> is the news of those IRS audits of two
> people TFG didn't like.
>
> Anyway, Asimov had a short story in, iirc,
> one of the mystery monthlies (but given
> he wrote in everywhere and was reprinted
> in more places, etc., etc...) where one
> of the key characters around the dinner
> table was a tax inspector, and he made a
> BIG POINT that objectivity (and doubly so,
> the public belief.. ) of tax agencies
> was critical in a civilized society.
>
> Ring any bells with anyone? Thanks
>

This may well be "The Family Man" which originally appeared
in EQMM (Nov 1976) with the editor-changed title "A Case of
Income-tax Fraud". When Asimov published the collection
"Casebook of the Black Widowers", he changed the title back
to his original/preferred "The Family Man".
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?72902

Tony

In <f569818c-37c7-42fd-9b32-d1f184dd390bn@googlegroups.com> Tony Nance <tonynance17@gmail.com> writes:
[snip]

>> BIG POINT that objectivity (and doubly so,
>> the public belief.. ) of tax agencies
>> was critical in a civilized society.
>>
>> Ring any bells with anyone? Thanks
>>

>This may well be "The Family Man" which originally appeared
>in EQMM (Nov 1976) with the editor-changed title "A Case of
>Income-tax Fraud". When Asimov published the collection
>"Casebook of the Black Widowers", he changed the title back
>to his original/preferred "The Family Man".
>http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?72902

Sounds like it, and the time frame matches
my memory.. (1976? NINETEENSEVENTYSIX!!??)

Thank you and the other[s] who did
or will.. respond..

--
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dannyb@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]

On 08 Jul 2022, Tony Nance wrote
(in article<f569818c-37c7-42fd-9b32-d1f184dd390bn@googlegroups.com>):

> On Friday, July 8, 2022 at 2:57:47 PM UTC-4, danny burstein wrote:
> > What brings this to mind is the news
> > (spoiler/warning!, political content...)
> >
> > is the news of those IRS audits of two
> > people TFG didn't like.
> >
> > Anyway, Asimov had a short story in, iirc,
> > one of the mystery monthlies (but given
> > he wrote in everywhere and was reprinted
> > in more places, etc., etc...) where one
> > of the key characters around the dinner
> > table was a tax inspector, and he made a
> > BIG POINT that objectivity (and doubly so,
> > the public belief.. ) of tax agencies
> > was critical in a civilized society.
> >
> > Ring any bells with anyone? Thanks
>
> This may well be "The Family Man" which originally appeared
> in EQMM (Nov 1976) with the editor-changed title "A Case of
> Income-tax Fraud". When Asimov published the collection
> "Casebook of the Black Widowers", he changed the title back
> to his original/preferred "The Family Man".
> http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?72902
>
> Tony

I suspect that the story is “The Family Man”.

I also suspect that when I read the story in the collection, relatively
recently, the reason why I didn’t spot the answer was that computer people
now think in terms of hexadecimal numbers, base 16, not octal, base 8. I
spend far too much time with MAC addresses and IPv6 addresses...