Posted on 08/22/2007 4:51:55 PM PDT by Man50D
The biggest issue is getting the govt to spend less money and have a smaller role in our lives.
How the money is collected to run the govt is much less important.
Democrats’ Purity Primary
By Ruth Marcus
Wednesday, August 22, 2007; Page A17
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/21/AR2007082101420.html
“Indeed, who takes money from lobbyists is the wrong question about an essential subject. Instead, voters who care — and I think voters should care — ought to ask: What is the candidate’s history on campaign finance reform, lobbying and ethics rules, and open government generally? How transparent is the candidate about campaign and personal finances? What steps will he or she take to limit the influence of money during the current campaign?”
My response...
If 53 percent of lobbyists in Washington are there to game the INCOME TAX CODE seeking tax favors from politicians on behalf of their clients, why is only ONE DEMOCRAT (Mike Gravel) favoring abolishing the Tax Code with a single, point-of-sale, PROGRESSIVE, national sales tax - with NO exceptions?
Several Republicans have stated that they would sign the FairTax bill (said “progressive national sales tax”), if elected President.
It would appear that the ONLY purity among the Democratic candidates are that they FULLY INTEND on CASHING IN on an income tax system that screws the working man, woman, family. Not only by virtue of interest, audits, penalties, liens, property confiscation . . . but with HIGHER PRICES required to recoup the corporate costs of paying the exorbitant salaries of these lobbyists!
The Dems are “playing two ends against the middle,” and us wage-earners are being SQUEEZED BREATHLESS!! I’ve joined FairTax.org, and I’m not alone.
The problems with the FairTax are greater than can be solved with a tweak or two. It begins with the idea that government can raise revenue by taxing itself without recognizing that taxing government increases the cost of government.
It continues with the denial that a sales tax at FairTax rates creates a powerful motive to avoid paying the tax and that with motive, ways will be found, and that enforcement will not intrude on the privacy of taxpayers
FairTaxers both advance and reject the idea that taxes collected at the register will impact spending (FairTax paradox).
Deny the inflationary impact of the tax.
Claim the tax promotes economic freedom as if paying a 30% tax before one may eat is the hallmark of freedom.
It is a fraud, beginning with the rate (23 or 30%?) and ending with the promise of transparency and control of government spending.
Government is supported by cash advances on the credit card and you think it makes a difference where the monthly payment is made?
The current system permits a "hidden tax" in higher prices.So the Fairtax exposes it how?
Let's see:
Increased take home pay.All lies?
Prices about the same as now AFTER THE TAX.
Checks in the mail every month.
Increased buying power.
More money for savings.
Easier to save for a house.
25% lower interest rates.
No decrease in government funding.
Dr. Laurence Kotlikoff considers this matter of the UTMOST urgency in order to STOP AN ECONOMIC MELTDOWN which is ON THE WAY!Kotlikoff:
Eliminating complexity and distortions would be cause enough for reforming the federal income tax, but there is a much more pressing reason: notwithstanding recent wishful projections about future government surpluses, our fiscal house is not in order. Indeed, getting it in order would require not cutting federal income taxes, as some in this chamber advocate, but immediately and permanently raising them by over 25 percent.....---------------
...So what does taxing consumption have to do with achieving a generationally equitable fiscal policy? Again, essentially everything. The reason is that the current elderly as well as the baby boomers, who will shortly retire, have one primary economic activity left to accomplish - consumption. And under a consumption tax, they will pay a lot more in future taxes than they would under the current tax system....
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Social Security benefits - would be automatically raised in response to a sales-tax induced increase in the price level. Hence, the Fair Tax features not just a demographic rebate, but also, implicitly, a rise in Social Security benefits. If government transfers to the poor young were also effectively indexed to the price level, the adoption of the Fair Tax would also trigger a rise in those transfer payments as well....
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.....Were the very staid and well established businessmen and women who advocate the Fair Tax to proclaim that their tax reform 1) levies a tax on the holdings of wealth, 2) provides a highly progressive tax rebate, and 3) implies an increase in Social Security benefits and, most likely, transfers to the poor, they would probably be viewed as members of a vast left-wing conspiracy. But this is precisely what they are recommending.
The fact that a consumption tax is, in part, a tax on wealth is well know to public finance economists, but not to the general public. The reason is that when a consumption tax is levied, it lowers the amount of actual consumption that can be purchased with a given amount of wealth since some of the wealth must be spent on the consumption taxes. Stated differently, the imposition of a consumption tax visits an immediate real capital loss on wealth holders because their assets no longer have as large a claim on current or future consumption.....
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....In shifting to a consumption tax, the U.S. would shift more of the tax burden onto the current middle class and rich elderly and partly reverse the postwar process of taking from the young and giving to the old. In addition to depressing national consumption and raising national saving, the switch to consumption taxation would, as indicated above, ameliorate our grievous imbalance in generational policy.....
If prices rise 25% for the fair tax and lowered by the amount of income taxes buried in the price of goods and services, where does the price land? Does it go up or down?
I haven’t had a good answer to that.
I do like tax simplification, I get several more volumes on my shelf with each simplification or reform. Each is more complex than the reform from before.
If prices rise 25% for the fair tax and lowered by the amount of income taxes buried in the price of goods and services, where does the price land? Does it go up or down?Don't you mean if prices are reduced the amount of income tax then rise 30% (not 25%) for the fairtax, where does the price land?...Prices including the tax will rise.
There is not 23% income tax in everything we buy...period (unless you want to include employee's wages, which AFFT does).
I do like tax simplification, I get several more volumes on my shelf with each simplification or reform. Each is more complex than the reform from before.Oddly enough some of that simplification came from Republican Ways and Means Chairman Archer, who said he was going to pull the tax code out by it's roots...He was a Fairtaxer favorite because of that little lie.
If prices rise 25% for the fair tax and lowered by the amount of income taxes buried in the price of goods and services, where does the price land? Does it go up or down?Don't take my word for it. Here's the quote from the Fairtax economist (from above).I haven’t had a good answer to that.
Social Security benefits - would be automatically raised in response to a sales-tax induced increase in the price level.
No way would “libs” support this whole-heartedly.
The core of being a “lib” politician is the control you want to have over people - thus the confusion over higher tax revenues (to spend) and lower tax rates (less control). They’ll always pick the control route.
SS, unfortunately, is a separate issue.
It also needs to be jettisoned.
One last question, if what you say is true that prices go up and SS benefits go up. What value do I place on the fact that I no longer worry about the following: keeping receipts, penalties and interest, having my life ruined, organizing tax records, spending on an accountant, having an office full of tax records from prior years? I don’t know about you, but I would pay 5000 or 10000 more each year if I was free to enjoy my life. Now you might answer that it is cheaper to just do my tax return honestly and comply with the tax laws. My answer is that I have never seen a tax return that complied because there is nobody that knows what complied is. The answers to what is compliance vary from attorney to attorney and from accountant to accountant. No
sane person can determine from the tax laws what is compliance. The beauty of this type of slavery (IRS) is that the IRS gets to determine compliance after the fact. If they want you off the street, it is fairly easy to ruin you financially first, then determine whether you complied or not. If having achieved your financial demise, you win against the overwhelming resources of the state, exactly what did you win?
ABSOLUTELY!!!
I have long held that the entire debate can be reduced to whether or not we in the U.S. really do want to be a truly FREE people again. If we do want that then we must rid ourselves of the communist inspired income tax and the IRS as we can never again be truly free with those impediments in place. If we don't - if we wish to remain slaves - I suppose what we currently have is ideal.
Apologies for the tardy reply. Certainly cash will be acceptable. Is that how you and your friends conduct business? You buy everything in cash? Home purchases, car purchases, clothes purchases, tickets for the game? Interesting...
So instead of having to report all your financial information, your employer only has to report wages and the employee doesn’t have to report anything.
Sounds like a big improvement.
In violation of the guarantee of being secure in your persons or papers.
Leftists seem to have a HUGE problem with someone tracking terrorists' phone calls - but NO problem with people being forced under threat of incarceration to provide tons of private information.
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