Wealth & Money Quote by Bud Abbott

Abbott’s line lands because it smuggles a pretty dark accusation inside a casual showbiz observation. On the surface, he’s explaining a trend: American stars decamping to Europe to make movies. Underneath, he’s sketching a whole moral economy where the government’s tax apparatus doesn’t just collect money, it reshapes character. “The tax guys” aren’t neutral bureaucrats; they’re antagonists in a comedy routine who function like a crooked casting director, turning ordinary people into “thieves” by force of circumstance.

The phrasing is the trick. “Making pictures in Europe” sounds quaint and professional, almost innocent, then comes the hard pivot: “making thieves out of everybody.” Abbott turns tax avoidance into a kind of defensive reflex, not a sin but a survival skill. It’s also a sly equalizer: not just the rich, not just the reckless, but “everybody.” That exaggeration is where the comic heat is, but it also doubles as a preemptive alibi for celebrity behavior. If everyone would do it, then stars doing it aren’t uniquely greedy; they’re simply more able to act.

Contextually, it fits the mid-century moment when high marginal tax rates, postwar government expansion, and the rise of international film production collided. Europe offered cheaper shoots, fresh locations, and crucially, financial structures that could soften the IRS bite. Abbott’s joke captures the cultural resentment that taxes don’t merely fund society; they provoke loophole-hunting and offshore glamour, turning “patriotism” into a line item.