The best primary reason I've seen put forth is that the government taxes in order to 'make room' in the economy for the production of public goods. Taxing both

The best primary reason I've seen put forth is that the government taxes in order to 'make room' in the economy for the production of public goods. Taxing both suppresses consumption and allows you to fine tune whose consumption gets suppressed. In thoery it's a better system. However tax policy in the US is broken because it favors economic parasites and looters.