Disease“tax”is like income tax. The more you work,the more tax you pay The higher exposure to the disease,the higher the expected cost of disease As taxes increase,so does the excess burden When income taxes are high,people will look for all sorts of loopholes(offshore banking,obscure farm subsidies, etc)to avoid them.The cost of taking time to find these loopholes is the excess burden of the income tax. Likewise,as diseases get more severe,people take more and more costly measures to avoid them.When a case of Ebola is discovered,towns will be quarantined and uncontaminated food will be flown in at great expense. Bhattacharya,Hyde and Tu-HealthEconomicsBhattacharya, Hyde and Tu – Health Economics Disease “tax” is like income tax…  The more you work, the more tax you pay  The higher exposure to the disease, the higher the expected cost of disease  As taxes increase, so does the excess burden  When income taxes are high, people will look for all sorts of loopholes (offshore banking, obscure farm subsidies, etc) to avoid them. The cost of taking time to find these loopholes is the excess burden of the income tax.  Likewise, as diseases get more severe, people take more and more costly measures to avoid them. When a case of Ebola is discovered, towns will be quarantined and uncontaminated food will be flown in at great expense