The difference being Thoreau withheld taxes from the government whereas your taxes are withheld by your employers for the government Employers are like Uber or Amazon; a middle-man between governments and citizens.. Nearly a century later, we have the Gandhian disobedience to bargain with the British Raj for Indian (and Pakistani) independence. Even at this point, it was possible in most cases to follow Thoreau’s lead as the technology of money hadn’t yet undergone the radical electronic transformation of today: wages in cash were still a thing and taxes were still personally or manually collected and not withheld via the PAYE/PAYG mechanisms of today creating an avenue, even for the commoner, to negotiate with those in charge.