1945: I got into the bus full of taxpayers who were giving some money to a taxpayer who had on his taxpayer's stomach a little box which allowed the other taxpayers to continue their taxpayers' journeys. I noticed in this bus a taxpayer with a long taxpayer's neck and whose taxpayer's head bore a taxpayer's felt hat encircled by a plait the like of which no taxpayer ever wore before. Suddenly the said taxpayer peremptorily addressed a nearby taxpayer, complaining bitterly that he was purposely treading on his taxpayer's toes every time other taxpayers got on or off the taxpayers' bus. Then the angry taxpayer went and sat down in a seat for taxpayers which another taxpayer had just vacated. — Raymond Queneau, 'from Polyptotes' in Exercises in Style, 1945 (Eng. 1958)
2023 March 8, Howard Johnston, “Was Marples the real railway wrecker?”, in RAIL, number 978, page 53:
The late Professor Pat White was an outspoken critic. In his 1986 book Forgotten Railways, he dismissed as smoke and mirrors the oft-used argument that 33% of rail routes carried only 1% of the traffic, as it ignores the fact that a third of the national road network also only carried 2% of cars and lorries. But unlike rail, road got away with it because no mention was made of how much it cost the taxpayer to keep them usable.