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Fundamental Tax Reform Is Now Unstoppable
Forbes ^ | Oct. 26, 2011 | Louis Woodhill

Posted on 10/28/2011 9:54:33 PM PDT by fightinJAG

With Rick Perry’s call for a 20% Flat Tax, the movement for fundamental, pro-growth tax reform became unstoppable. Perry, Herman Cain, and Mitt Romney are now the only viable candidates for the Republican presidential nomination remaining. With both Cain and Perry now offering dramatic pro-growth tax reform proposals, Romney will either jump on the tax reform bandwagon or be left in the dust (or possibly both).

The only pro-growth tax cuts in Romney’s 59-point economic plan are a reduction in the corporate income tax rate to 25% (from 35% today) and the elimination of the death tax. However, both Perry and Cain are similarly calling for repeal of the death tax. Also, Perry’s plan would cut the corporate income tax rate to 20%, and Cain’s plan would reduce it to the equivalent of 9%.

(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 999; cain; election2012; flattax; hermancain; occupywallstreet; perry; rickperry; romney; taxes; taxreform
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To: bigbob

He won’t.......that will confirm once more he is a flopper.


41 posted on 10/28/2011 10:54:57 PM PDT by federal__reserve (Perry is a good man but his one on one debates with Obama keeps me awake at nights.)
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To: All
I agree with other comments, Newt isn't completely out of it and has a better flat tax plan than Perry's in my view. Newt has the added benefit of an ability to readily articulate and defend it.

Perry's further down in polling even though he started off collecting a lot of money, his momentum is heading in the other direction as vote casting gets closer.

I like 9-9-9 but I'd take Newt's flat tax.

42 posted on 10/28/2011 10:56:08 PM PDT by newzjunkey (Republicans will find a way to reelected Obama.)
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To: fightinJAG
Well put. Gingrich really pissed me off when he sandbagged Paul Ryan. And that stupid stunt with Stretch on the couch re global warming.

He's out of touch sometimes, but when he gets tuned in, he's a bull dog that no one can touch in a debate.

Anyway, (off topic) these guys should expand their platform beyond taxes and come up with very specific deficit reduction action items such as:

Eliminate all subsidies, eliminate the Department of Energy, Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Education, Housing and Urban Development, et cetera.

43 posted on 10/28/2011 10:58:36 PM PDT by Cobra64 (Too many people are incapable of critical thinking. Common sense isn't common anymore.)
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To: Cobra64

Eliminate all subsidies, eliminate the Department of Energy, Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Education, Housing and Urban Development, et cetera.


Eliminate all that and more especially the UN, but this is something else we have to run silent on as all those departments have rat voters with rat influence.

We need to stop demanding of Cain and Perry that they articulate anything that aggravates, rather than attracts voters we need but don’t have.

Obama set the trap a couple days ago: ‘These people are going to take everything away’ and we need to worry about how he intends to expand this tack.

We need to be loudly describing the things we intend to BUILD and MAKE and IMPROVE right now... send a positive, attractive, exciting message. We’re battling for the Independents and Reagan Democrats: we need to be talking about the Shining City on the Hill. Time’s short.

We can exact revenge later.


44 posted on 10/28/2011 11:11:13 PM PDT by txhurl (Did you want to talk or fish? Or feed the fish?)
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To: fightinJAG
Everything has its tipping point and we are there as far as the present tax code is concerned.

I just don't believe it. Yes, many, if not most of us on the Right want to see the tax code overhauled. Me...I'd like to see the income tax repealed, but that isn't likely to happen, unfortunately. So a flat tax will help. But I really don't have much faith that an overwhelming majority of the American people will stand up and demand serious, substantive tax reform.

45 posted on 10/28/2011 11:30:08 PM PDT by Wolfstar
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To: RobbyS
And by rich they are talking about people whose taxable income is about $300,000 a year. A nice sum, but that includes ,many couples and of course small businesses. Dear Lord but they have such a magical understanding of what wealth is! Like it comes out of a bottle in the form of a genie.

BS.

Take all taxes into account and the "rich", for purposes of taxation begins around 75k.

Do we keep having to revisit the graphs as to who actually pays most of the income taxes?

It ain't the "rich" and it ain't the parasites.

46 posted on 10/28/2011 11:50:23 PM PDT by Publius6961 (My world was lovely, until it was taken over by parasites.)
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To: Publius6961

That 300,0000 figure is the top 1%. In practical terms, considering their vulnerability to taxation, the people who make much less are at risk. Tax collectors tend to be harder on the less powerful, because the latter are politically unconnected.


47 posted on 10/29/2011 12:18:28 AM PDT by RobbyS (Back in Jefferson)
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To: fightinJAG

Russia has had a 13% flat tax since 2000 and has posted federal budget surpluses for years. Before that, it had a progressive income tax inherited from the Soviet Union that no one paid and it was in the same boat we are in today. Real change will improve America’s economic fortunes. We simply can no longer afford the status quo.


48 posted on 10/29/2011 12:35:04 AM PDT by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives In My Heart Forever)
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To: fightinJAG
I love the fact that Cain and Perry are talking about change in the tax code. It's been a long time coming.

As the Chamber Brothers said, "Time has come today". We may be on the verge of an overhaul to the tax code.

49 posted on 10/29/2011 2:01:22 AM PDT by A Navy Vet (An Oath is Forever.)
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To: jpsb

Both Perry and Newt plans have the same problems:

1) They are “optional” which guarantees less revenue and therefor tax hikes as soon as revenues are found to be short of expectations.

2) They do not eliminate the corporate tax and the political corruption it creates.

3) They preserve deductions and credits that keep them from being “flat”, and prove both politicians are simply panderers advocating the government continue its failed policies of social engineering.

4) Their huge standard exemptions guarantee even more people will pay zero taxes than the current 47%. They will have no reason not to vote themselves more free stuff if they know somebody else gets stuck with the bill.


50 posted on 10/29/2011 2:12:50 AM PDT by Kellis91789 (There's a reason the mascot of the Democratic Party is a jackass.)
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To: wjcsux

“The Earned Income Tax Credit needs to be flushed down the crapper too. “

Newt’s plan retains this credit even if the person takes his “flat tax” option. That is amazingly cowardly. It shows Newt is too ready for political compromise for my taste.

At least the MinMax Tax plan makes these credits moot by setting a minimum tax of 10% and maximum of 15%. If credits and deductions reduce your tax bill to less than 10% of total income of all types, too bad, you still owe the 10%. If your deductions and credits leave you still owing more than 15%, you only owe the maximum of 15%. It replaces the Corporate income tax and payroll tax with a single 10% tax on businesses for payroll and expenditures to foreign entities. No payroll tax for the worker, but the employer pays it on all forms of compensation: wages, salaries, stock options, and fringe benefits. Corporate profits are not taxed — those profits are taxed later as regular income when the shareholder receives them as dividends or as capital gains. MinMax raises the same $2.4T tax revenue as the current tax system, and is my favorite tax reform plan.


51 posted on 10/29/2011 3:04:12 AM PDT by Kellis91789 (There's a reason the mascot of the Democratic Party is a jackass.)
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To: fightinJAG

Fundamentally fear more not less


52 posted on 10/29/2011 4:10:57 AM PDT by Flavius (What hopes for victory, Gaius Crastinus? What grounds for encouragement ?)
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To: fightinJAG
The Fedzilla goes away under Cain’s 999 plan.

No - it gets bigger since there will be a sales tax too, and you'll have an entirely new wing of the IRS devoted to enforcing it. And an entire new array of forms to document whatever you sold or bought. Every sale will be taxable in theory, so just selling a used car will require evidence, that it is "used" if the used item exemption some have mentioned regarding the Cain plan makes it through.

Also, some sales will end up being exempt, for instance those to the government itself. So if you are a small business you'll charge your normal customers the sales tax but not the local social security office. And pretty soon you'll be filing a ten page "Federal Sales Tax Return".

The complexity and headache of the federal tax system doesn't come from the calculation of the tax itself, it comes from the determination of what is payroll, income, etc. and all the details of collection and ways the government rigs the system to generate penalties and increase tax revenues.

53 posted on 10/29/2011 5:12:53 AM PDT by freeandfreezing
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To: fightinJAG
"I was just a reminded that a lot of times Gingrich has his head in the Ivory Tower and doesn’t pick up important clues from the conservative zeitgeist."

Very true, Newt is somewhat unreliable as a real or true conservative. I am willingly to take that chance with Newt since I think our problems are so huge that unreliable will not be an issue. Also Newt, like Perry can be made to see the light if you put enough heat on him. I wanted Sarah, but I would trust Newt or Cain to clean up crony capitalism and corruption in D.C. Not so sure that would be at the top of Perrys' to do list.

54 posted on 10/29/2011 6:35:03 AM PDT by jpsb
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To: Utmost Certainty

Right on. 999 is infinitely better than the Perry Flat Tax.


I agree and I think the 9% national sales tax that replaces payroll taxes is a stroke of genious because it takes in money from those who hide under the tax-radar now. The only argument against it is future congresses will raise it but all I’ve got to say about that is congress will raise what we have now so what’s the problem? If we bring spending under control, cut back the size of government there will be NO NEED for any increases. Our economy would boom under Cain and I believe that congress might actually need to CUT the rate!!!!! I know, I’m dreaming there but it should happen.


55 posted on 10/29/2011 7:44:37 AM PDT by New Jersey Realist (America: home of the free because of the brave)
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To: doc1019

The IRS, one of the largest bureaucracies in the US, will not go away without a struggle...


Our usurper-in-chief would add 1600 more agents to enforce his healthkill plan. Cain and his 999 plan will stop all that for sure.


56 posted on 10/29/2011 7:47:08 AM PDT by New Jersey Realist (America: home of the free because of the brave)
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To: fightinJAG

You know what helps the poor? What helps everyone else: freedom and pro-growth economic policies.


Precisely. The poor would then have a choice to pull themselves up like the rest of us have to or they can decide to stay where they are. Freedom of choice - isn’t that what libs are all about? It’s time for them to leave the plantation, respect themselves again and contribute to society. Somehow I can’t see the hoodlums and thugs in the inner cities getting onboard this train but decent people know how to survive and have been doing it for thousands of years without government handouts.


57 posted on 10/29/2011 7:56:20 AM PDT by New Jersey Realist (America: home of the free because of the brave)
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To: jpsb
Yeah, if you totally ignore his record, Newt is a great talker. For example there is Newt's jumping on the Global Warming train, and his chastising Conservatives for not rallying behind Dede Scusaffasa in NY 23. Then his trash talking about "right wing social engineering". Newt has a long record of talking a good game and being just another GOP Establishment water boy.

In a choice between Conservative principals and political expediency, Newt will go with expediency every time.

58 posted on 10/29/2011 6:36:43 PM PDT by MNJohnnie (Giving more money to DC to fix the Debt is like giving free drugs to addicts think it will cure them)
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To: freeandfreezing
No - it gets bigger since there will be a sales tax too, and you'll have an entirely new wing of the IRS devoted to enforcing it.

No it doesn't. Since the rest of the tax code goes away under 9-9-9. The IRS get's smaller under 9-9-9.

59 posted on 10/29/2011 6:40:30 PM PDT by MNJohnnie (Giving more money to DC to fix the Debt is like giving free drugs to addicts think it will cure them)
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To: newzjunkey

Newt’s flat tax is an attempt to hijack the reform movement without actually reforming the tax code in a substantive fashion. Problem with Perry’s, and Newt’s Flat Tax, plans are numerous.

Both plans are “what do I need to say to get votes” plan rather then “what do we need to do to fix the tax code” plan.

Neither broaden the tax base thus leaving the current system of payers and payees in play for future political exploitation.

They keep in place the corrupt practice of playing favorites in the tax code by still granting special exemptions. This is the greatest flaw in the Flat Tax plans. They leave in the politically popular exemptions to pander to certain voter blocks. It the best example of where the Flat Tax plans are not serious attempts to address the fundamental problems in the tax code but a political gimmick designed to rejuvenate flagging campaigns.

The Flat Tax maintains the current focus on taxing income instead of consumption thus punishing the producers at the expense of the users.

It leaves in place the current ability for trust funds and the massively wealthy to avoid paying any tax by structuring their payouts in forms other then income.

It does nothing to tap the underground off the books economy.

So while the Flat Tax is an improvement over the current system, it is merely tinkering with the existing tax code while leaving in place the same corrupt, flawed foundation.

Of the various tax plans, Cain’s 9-9-9 is the much better plan


60 posted on 10/29/2011 6:45:57 PM PDT by MNJohnnie (Giving more money to DC to fix the Debt is like giving free drugs to addicts think it will cure them)
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