fix?? that seems to be what is attempted every year, and more and more rules, regs and other b.s. is added....
TOO BAD if folks planned on the tax code remaining more or less the same...
start it over.....
A sales tax AND an income tax? No way!
You can’t fix STUPID!
Fixing taxes is like taking drugs from Rock Stars.
Large corporations and businesses like the tax code just fine the way it is. You get the what you lobby for.
You can fix the tax code by nothing short of reducing it to one page. 9% no deductions no exemptions on all earned income. Tax business the same or no tax on business at all. If you couple that with 95% reduction in regulation of business prosperity will explode for everyone. Unfortunately the government will also get much more in revenue. Perhaps we need to make that an initial 9% with a 5% reduction in the rate annually. Make it an Amendment so Congress can’t fiddle with it.
The way to “correct” the tax code would be to change it such that the IRS could not be used as a tool to violate the rights of the citizenry.
Flat tax doesn’t get rid of the IRS.
He's saying this like it's a bad thing. Right now, the top 10% of income earners in the US carry almost 70% of the federal income tax load. The lowest 51% pay nothing. To me, if you don't have anything in the game, you don't get to play. This means 51% of the population shouldn't have the right to vote in federal elections. Raising rates on those 51% doesn't bother me in the least. I think a flat tax of 17% (Friedman's rate) with a $20K personal deduction would work. Saying you can't make this kind of change because businesses have made their plans based on the current tax code is a specious argument at best. Businesses adjust to changing tax codes all the time. With the flat tax, you could file your return on a postcard. As it is now, try calling the IRS to answer a complex tax question...five calls, five different answers. They don't even know the answers. Nope...it's time to scrap the current tax code and I think a flat tax is the best alternative.
Little things like the accelerated depreciation allotment for various industries, like NASCAR tracks, and corporate jet values. These add up, and explain why a flat tax is so despised by the actual lobbyest controlled government of our country.
My suggestion? Any public employee, from dog catcher to senator, who accepts a bribe dies, screaming, for the first offense. (You wouldn't have to do it too many times for even Democrats to get the point...)
We need a flat tax that gets rid of every deduction for everything.
Put in a basic deduction for the first X amount for poverty level, and everyone pays the same flat rate for anything over that amount.
Married, single, wages, pension, interst earnings, capital gains, all taxed the same flat rate.
There are very few people in Congress I trust. They got us where we are and I do not believe they will correct anything — they want the money they get for “fixing” the Code.
A few years ago I heard a (UK) Conservative Party candidate for office telling the voters how much better his party would run the National Health Service than the Liberal Party had done. That is not the mindset we need with our tax system. As much as I respect JimmyP, we need to have the most simple, most flat tax that we can fund essential government functions with.
The Tax System serves TWO purposes: the fist is to fund the essential (and not the frivolous) government services. The second is to make the cost of government visible to every citizen, even citizens who are disabled or otherwise are net recipients of tax monies.
Out tax system is a giant FAIL that is imposed on us for the power it gives Washington more than the money it collects. After all, government has given itself the power to print and borrow all the money it needs. Why have taxes when you have the printing press? But that is an outrage for a different thread.
The current tax code is over 77,000 pages and requires a fork lift (or two) to move a hard copy. No single individual actually knows the contents of entire code. Even IRS personnel can’t correctly fill out a tax return every time.
A monstrosity like that can’t be mended. It needs to be ended. The flat tax, or better yet, the Fair Tax is what we need.
Whatever plan eliminates the IRS....I good with.