Why is the FairTax better than our current system?

Americans For Fair Taxation Website ^ | Current | Americans for Fair Taxation

[Eaglewatcher]

Why is the FairTax better than our current system? Our present tax system is one of the reasons that people are finding it so difficult to get ahead these days. It is one of the reasons the next generation may not have a standard of living as high as this generation. Cars replaced the horse and buggy, the telephone replaced the telegraph, and the FairTax replaces the income tax. The income tax is holding us back and making it more difficult than it needs to be to improve our families’ standard of living. It makes it needlessly difficult for our businesses to compete in international markets. It wastes vast resources on complying with needless paperwork. We can do better and we must.

[Eaglewatcher]

To continue.

[TexasTransplant]

good bye IRS

[YouPosting2Me]

Uhhhhhhhh, because... it'sssssss... fair?

[Blood of Tyrants]

The number of people who claim to be conservatives yet hold so tightly onto this basic plank of the Communist Manifesto is amazing and disheartening.

[IndyInVa]

Major reasons.

1. Most of us would consider it a HUGE improvement if we didn't have to waste so much time and agony filling out the stinking tax forms. Multiply all that lost time times the number of people who have to do it and it is a COLOSSAL waste of American productivity. Not to mention the anxiety, annoyance, headaches...........

2. Abolishing the IRS would mean that it could not be used as a weapon of coercion, intimidation, and abuse by Hilary and her ilk.

3. It would be very difficult for the rich to duck this. The politicians who tinker with tax laws are always claiming that the rich don't pay their fair share. (very true, it's the upper middle class that carry the greatest n tax burden, with the rest of the middle class close on their heels. The rich can shelter it.) This would close the loopholes for the rich.

[G.Mason]

Being as the Fair Tax is a users tax makes it just that, fair.

The elimination of all other taxes makes it a must do item.

" ... the briefest of overviews:

Simply put, HR25 would provide for the repeal of the 16th Amendment (the income tax amendment) and the dismantling of the IRS. All personal and corporate income taxes would end, as would all payroll taxes. There would not be one cent of federal taxes of any nature taken out of your paychecks. No more Social Security taxes. No more Medicare taxes. You earn $2,000 a payday; you get $2,000 a payday. The federal government would be funded through a national sales tax on goods and services sold at the retail level. No taxes on investments. No taxes on savings. You only get taxed on what you spend at the retail level. Store your earnings in a shoebox if you wish. They won't be taxed ... "

From http://www.townhall.com/print/print_story.php?sid=12821&loc=/opinion/columns/nealboortz/2004/08/27/12821.html

[camle]

I don't doubt that its' better, but i hardly think it's the best.

it favors those who don't have to spend all their money on supporting their families - the rich.

so i consider it a wolf in sheep's slothing.

[ex-snook]

Now obviously you don't get how great this 'fair tax' really is. You see everyone gets a tax decrease while the government expenses increase! Isn't that a miracle? It's like the goose that lays the golden egg. So you gotta like that goose [no pun intended].

Truth is ya can't cut taxes while federal government costs increase. The trick is to find out under which shell the tax increase is going. Shell No. 1 - taxes end up in States and local government. Shell No. 2 - taxes are deferred to future generations. Shell No. 3 - hidden in consumption costs.

[Concho]

But, if for no other reason, doing away with the IRS is reason enough.

[griswold3]

Since reading Peggy Noonan's article last week, I've been disappointed. She exposes the notion that people are realizing more and more they can go to the voting booth and take other peoples property.

[Willie Green]

Writing science fiction for about a penny a word is no way to make a living. If you really want to make a million, the quickest way is to start your own religion.

~ L. Ron Hubbard

...the movement for consumption-based taxation has been hijacked by a group of extremists whose principal interest is abolishing the Internal Revenue Service.²¹ They believe that if virtually all federal taxes are abolished and replaced with a retail sales tax like those in the states, then the states can simply collect the federal government's revenue for it, thereby allowing for abolition of the IRS...

²¹ The Church of Scientology originated this legislation as part of a campaign against the IRS because it refused for many years to allow gifts to the church to be deducted as legitimate charitable contributions, on the grounds that it was not a true church. The IRS eventually relented. See Davis (1997) and Starobin (1995) for discussions of the Church of Scientology's role in the sales tax campaign.

Davis, Bob. 1997. "CATS Out of the Bag." World, 12:9 (May 31/June 7).
Starobin, Paul. 1995. "No Returns." National Journal (March 18): 666-671.

source

For years now, the American government has established state religion. No, it's not evangelical Christianity. It's Scientology.

Because of a 1993 secret deal with the Internal Revenue Service, members of L. Ron Hubbard's Church of Scientology are allowed to write off costly Scientologist "auditing" and "training" services as charitable gift deductions. Anyone who sends their child to religious school, however, is banned from writing off tuition.

What exactly are Scientologists writing off? Thousands of dollars worth of pure baloney. As authors Andrew Breitbart and Mark Ebner detail in their fascinating book, "Hollywood, Interrupted," Scientology itself is a load of psychedelic babble, and an expensive load at that. It costs over $300,000 to reach the top levels of this cult. "Auditing" -- the service that the IRS allows Scientologists to write off -- is a method of purging "thetans."

Excerpted from: L. Ron Hubbard has better lobbyists than God

The cynically misnamed "FairTax" is a red-herring...
fraudulent "reform" legislation that is intended to sidetrack and derail legitimate tax reform proposals such as the Flat Tax.

[rconawa]

If you look at taxes none are "fair", but I think this method is the best because the rich do spend their money and would pay the most in tax, also, blinding the government by eliminating the IRS would be a desirable outcome. With the flat tax you still have the government asking who are you, where did your money come from and what did you do with it? I like the idea of April 15th being just another day and controlling my tax by controlling my spending. I see no red hearing here, but I still see major problems with other tax methonds - problems not with then money, but with the information collected.

[eskimo]

But, if for no other reason, doing away with the IRS is reason enough.

My guess is the "fair tax" scammers are lying about that too. If the IRS is to go away, the mechanism for that should be in any new tax law. It isn't and will likely never be.

All you hear from the tax scammers is that most people's taxes will decrease and there will be no corporate income tax. They have no answer for who will be taxed to make up for these decreases. I'd bet this nonsense is more like a con-game than a miracle.

[ex-snook]

"They have no answer for who will be taxed to make up for these decreases. I'd bet this nonsense is more like a con-game than a miracle."

Score!

When the 'fair taxers' show how to reduce the cost of government they will be worth listening to. In the meantime the 'fair taxers' are like the 'free traders' all slogans and no cattle.

[Wolfie]

And just what if they can't get the 16th Amendment repealed? We'll have both taxes in not time at all.

[camle]

i think it's all smoke and mirrors driven by the superrich who pay the lion's share now, but would pay less because they spend less of what they make to survive - unlike the poor who will have to pay more to make up the diff.

[Incitatus]

Right. There does seem to be a willful desire to avoid talking about the ugly reality of government spending.

I believe China owns something like a 3rd of the US' foreign debt (i.e. not including what the US owes to its own treasury). No matter what someone's opinions are regarding tax cuts and the Iraq war, surely no one can disagree that it's absurd to cut taxes AND wage an expensive war. If the dollar loses value anymore, the possibility of the Euro becoming the dominant currency will move further out of the realms of pure fantasy and into the realms of all likelyhood. And the economic ramifications of that are just to wild to comprehend.

[Willie Green]

but I think this method is the best because the rich do spend their money and would pay the most in tax

All sales taxes are inherently regressive, simply because "the rich" have greater discretionary control over their expenses. Those at the lowest end of the economic ladder are hit hardest simply because they MUST spend a greater portion of their meager resources on necessities.

[balrog666]

Excellent summary in those keywords.

[ancient_geezer]

And just what if they can't get the 16th Amendment repealed? We'll have both taxes in not time at all.

Hmmm, the 16th amendment has been in place almost 100yrs, the federal govenment has not been able to put both in place yet, in spite of several attempts to do so, nor is there any reason to believe they would have any better opportunity once the income tax is dead to put one back into place with a retail sales tax in place.

One primary point is certain, we will not see the end of the 16th amendment as long as this nation continues to have an income tax sytem in place with no replace on line and place. 100 years of almost continuous attempts to get 2/3rds of Congress to propose the repeal of the 16th amendment while under the chains of the income tax have repeatedly failed to gain the required traction to even be present for the states to ratify.

It is obvious that leaving an income tax as the primary mode of federal taxation will continue to prevent the repeal of the 16th, where with a viable and operation alterative can open the door to such repeal.