Hypothetical: You have just taken a job as a lobbyist for a tax reform group. They're letting you lobby Congress for the kind of tax system you think we should have.
What do you lobby for and why?
What do you lobby for and why?
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I think most of the problem is all the folks who want to make other folks pay their share. No deductions, credits, "targeted tax breaks" or whatever your flavor. Here is your oar, pull your weight.
We have all these fancy breaks for all kinds of folks.
I am not totally blind that there should be some distinction, so I am all in favor of a large personal exemption. But any other ways of making others pay your way.... forgetaboutit
I think most of the problem is all the folks who want to make other folks pay their share. No deductions, credits, "targeted tax breaks" or whatever your flavor. Here is your oar, pull your weight.
We have all these fancy breaks for all kinds of folks.
I am not totally blind that there should be some distinction, so I am all in favor of a large personal exemption. But any other ways of making others pay your way.... forgetaboutit
There is no need for a personal exemption if the tax rate is lowered and applied to all income and all deductions are eliminated.
Seriously why should someone pay less taxes because they choose to have a gaggle of kids?
That family will use way more government and state services than do I who have no children and they should pay for it.
I went with "No Tax" even though I don't see the income tax as unconstitutional. The 16th Amendment makes the income tax constitutional. It's certainly immoral, however.
I went with "No Tax" even though I don't see the income tax as unconstitutional. The 16th Amendment makes the income tax constitutional. It's certainly immoral, however.
"No tax" would be unconstitutional as the government must have some funds to carry out its constitutionally mandated responsibilities, and expressly permits congress to impose taxes in order to do that. The responsibilities of government are also expressly limited by that same Constitution, however, and should the government restrict itself to its Constitutional mandate, it would need a tiny fraction of the taxes it now collects in order to do it.
The Fair Tax/National Sales Tax, should it replace all other taxes now imposed by the Federal government, would require a repeal of the 16th Amendment to remove all temptation to Congress to reinstate an income tax.
I went with "No Tax" even though I don't see the income tax as unconstitutional. The 16th Amendment makes the income tax constitutional. It's certainly immoral, however.
"No tax" would be unconstitutional as the government must have some funds to carry out its constitutionally mandated responsibilities, and expressly permits congress to impose taxes in order to do that. The responsibilities of government are also expressly limited by that same Constitution, however, and should the government restrict itself to its Constitutional mandate, it would need a tiny fraction of the taxes it now collects in order to do it.
The Fair Tax/National Sales Tax, should it replace all other taxes now imposed by the Federal government, would require a repeal of the 16th Amendment to remove all temptation to Congress to reinstate an income tax.
I misunderstood what you meant then.
I favor a concept that embraces all the advantages of Fair Tax with the onerous effect on retail etc. It is a flat tax with no exemption or deduction. It is automatically collected as transaction occur through the banking system. Therefore it uses the largest possible tax base and thereby achieves the smallest tax rate. So before reacting that every move you make is being taxed -- stop and do the math. The addition of so many especially large players who paid no tax to the mix makes it excellent for everyone. Another absolute necessity to consider the APT tax of benefit to ALL is that EVERY other Federal tax must be eliminated -- then things, especially regarding business make sense.
Let's do the math. A family is fortunate and has income of 100K, spends or saves it all, and "churns" invested assets in the amount of 100k -- that would be $300k of transactions fopr a year. At a rate of 0.3% (3 cents per $1000) the family would pay $900 in total Federal tax. That's 0.3% on ech side of every transaction. If the family had the misfortunate of having the opposite side of every single transaction passed to them the worst case is $1800.
Sounds impossible but before the economic debacle of last year and still continuing the rate was only 0.25% -- we have a little more deficit to cover right now. That rate is based on using only 50% of the theoretical tax base which is a complex analysis using several databases to calculate, however, a current estimate is over a quadrillion dollars.
Still sound preposterous? The whole concept is certainly not mine - it was published in a peer review econ journal in 2000 by an internationally known Professor of Economics at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, Dr. Edgar Feige. Additionally, I have been debating this concept for about four years and objectively have yet to find an argument that makes it fatally flawed. The details of the idea and answers to the many obvious questions that pop up are found at apttax.com. The Automated Payment Transaction Tax[/url] . I encourage you to visit the site before discarding this really beneficial concept.
Lastly, why haven't you heard of this type of transaction tax -- because the volume of noise made by the Fair and Flat taxers is hard to beat -- though these are dead ideas but still provide political coverage for politicians wanted to support a tax reform proposal that they know will never fly -- they love that. Transaction taxes have met with such success in Latin America psrticularly Brazil, that the elites have kicked them out since they could not be evaded as is commonplace with their income and VAT tax. The recently proposed Tobin Tax to pay for the financial debacle is another example. These however have one very big difference with APT -- they have been focused on one part of the economy or they were used as add on the top of all other taxes -- not as a total replacement as with APT.
Flat tax, everyone pays the same, no exclusions no loop holes. With a base level at which one does not pay anything due to poverty.
Hypothetical: You have just taken a job as a lobbyist for a tax reform group. They're letting you lobby Congress for the kind of tax system you think we should have.
What do you lobby for and why?
Hypothetical: You have just taken a job as a lobbyist for a tax reform group. They're letting you lobby Congress for the kind of tax system you think we should have.
What do you lobby for and why?
A flat tax. One where everyone pays the same percentage on their earned and unearned incomes.
No tax breaks for the rich, no loopholes, no writeoffs, just a flat percentage tax rate for all americans.
Why? Because that would be fair.
Hypothetical: You have just taken a job as a lobbyist for a tax reform group. They're letting you lobby Congress for the kind of tax system you think we should have.
What do you lobby for and why?
A flat tax. One where everyone pays the same percentage on their earned and unearned incomes.
No tax breaks for the rich, no loopholes, no writeoffs, just a flat percentage tax rate for all americans.
Why? Because that would be fair.
Okay, based on my response to the Sgt, you and I are on the same page. But let me play devil's advocate here for a bit.
A Constitutional expectation of the federal government is that it will promote the general welfare. The general welfare could be seen as promoting the traditional family, promoting charity, promoting home ownership, promoting new business startups and business expansion, etc.
So long as this is applied evenly across the board without respect for the standing of any citizen, is there no room even in a flat tax for the government to promote such activity?