up to $2,000, which would have set aside, in a literal sense, a discrete “amount . . . necessarily consumed for the support of’ the taxpayer and his or her family. Opinion of the Justices, 82 N.H. at 572. This description, made in reference to an income tax exemption, is not applicable to the question of whether an income tax assessed on gross rather than net income is unfair, unreasonable, or disproportionate. Certainly nothing in that opinion suggested that such an exemption was necessary in order to render that tax constitutional. Where we have found that a tax was unfair, unreasonable, or disproportionate, the constitutional deficiency has been of a much different character than the one the petitioners allege here. See Claremont School Dist. v. Governor, 142 N.H. 462, 470-71 (1997) (<HOLDING>); Opinion of the Justices, 132 N.H. 777, 783-84
holding that state legislature should determine whether to cure discriminatory tax by enforcing tax as to all or forgiving tax in its entirety holding that property tax was a state tax and was thus disproportionate unreasonable and unfair because of discrepancies in tax rates of up to 400 between school districts holding that the essential purpose of use tax is the recoupment of lost sales tax revenue holding that the tax was indirect even though the recipient could not shift the tax to others holding that taxpayers failure to follow state requirement that he report change in federal income tax did not except state tax liability from discharge