And, as well as that scam, you may have come across the original scam which is that the airlines pass on costs, such as certain handling charges, as "taxes" when they are nothing of the sort.
Until the late '80s, perhaps early 90's, all these costs were simply included in the fare. One such cost was the "Passenger Load Supplement" charged by airports so that airlines paid a charge for airport use that varied directly with the number uplifted, alongside the landing charge for the aircraft type. This started in the '50s in UK, and encouraged many a start-up to develop its new regional routes as it was meant to.
Then one day an airline simply started calling the PLS a "Tax", and actually announced it as a new and dreadful imposition by the airports. They simply then added it to the fare that until then had included it, without any change in the fare. Others immediately copied this brilliant scheme, and overnight fares rose by around 20% because of this "new" "tax".
Encouraged by getting away with that piece of robbery, they then started to add other costs, hitherto included in the fare, and calling them "taxes" as well. And so the whole ridiculous, stupid scheme grew in which the fare got lower and lower and the "taxes" got higher and higher as costs were transferred from fares to "taxes".
It's the insult to our intelligence that gets to me. Anyone with half a brain cell knows that the absurd headline fare is not going to be the cost of the trip. But wading through the crap on most airlines' websites to get to the truth is very, very annoying. Some are better than others; BA (who were the first to think of changing PLS to "tax") are good in this respect.
For the record, the only real "tax" is the Air Passenger Duty. All the others are simply charges to the airline from its suppliers, or, in the case of some airlines, charges they have simply dreamed up to add to the fare as another "tax".
And that's why you won't get "taxes" refunded.