Education Minister Kadar Asmal's valiant plan to extend free basic education to all our children up to matric illustrates an international conundrum of the first order. If education and other services like health and water are to be seen as human rights, how are they to be funded? Can we envisage a situation in which these services are free to everyone, while those who can afford them are taxed appropriately? Is it possible to come up with a new taxation system that gives governments the revenues they need, engaging the commitment of electorates to the health of societies as a whole? These are the two central questions this editorial seeks to answer.