The 'they were pursuing short term profits' spin on scheme collapse, is a popular one, since it is actually true. Blaming an economic collapse on short term profit seeking seems as pointless as blaming the crash of an aircraft on gravity, but it is not as stupid as it seems. The short term profit seeking that caused the economic collapse, was your short term profit seeking, which taxed away the productive part of society. It gave you short term wealth and it gave your political successors long term poverty as production was bound to come to a halt with productive people throwing in the towel. You are of course not actually going to say that.

It is important that during all schemes you make the slaves accomplices in your scheme. This way their protests are postponed. Most schemes advise you to get the tax slaves to put their signature of agreement under your license to kill, because you tell them you are coercing their neighbors for their benefit. After doing so you of course go to their neighbors and repeat the procedure. This approval of the slaves is not required to get moral justification for extortion, since nothing can, but it is required to prevent the tax slave from protesting on principle. He already compromised his principles on signing and is less likely to object to his own coercion after agreeing to his neighbors coercion, certainly if you implied that his signature was pivotal for the coercion of his neighbor in a 'good' way.

For the 'short term profit spin'  to work you simply tell the tax slave you will legally plunder the productive side of the society if he signs on the dotted line, for his benefit. The tax slave will see short term profit, but knows the producer will collapse in the long run.

The tax slave's own short term profit seeking then is a cause of the economic collapse and since he unconsciously knows he betrayed principles for short term profit, this scheme will make him self attack over his own losses in the economic crash.

Remember that not only the government is in the business of taking present tangle goods in exchange for future imaginary goods. Check any Dilbert cartoon. The difference is that you can use coercion when they figure it out, while your comrades in business can not. They have to buy your coercion.