A closer look
Russian Emperor Peter the Great implemented an annual tax on facial hair in 1698 to force his citizens to adopt modern Western European grooming standards. If you wanted to rock a magnificent, untamed bushy beard in seventeenth-century Russia, you had to pay a steep premium and carry a physical copper token that essentially acted as a receipt for your facial hair. It was an early, utterly absurd form of behavioral economics designed to modernize a society by hitting hipsters right in their coin purses. Those who refused to pay the tax had their beards forcibly and publicly shaved off by state officials. Imagine the modern revenue potential if governments started taxing terrible fashion choices like mullets or crocs. Actually, do not give them any ideas, because they will absolutely jump at the chance to monetize our terrible aesthetic decisions!
