BoJester

Think about the whole concept of your flat tax idea. Badly flawed logic, and here is why.
Local and state taxes
Sales taxes
Property taxes
These are all deductions from the federal tax. Do you want to eliminate them? The burden shifts to the poor and working middle class.
Assume the value of 'welfare', which is what the majority of the advocates on this site refer to is worth $24k a year, which is higher than reality. A flat 10% is $2400.
on the other end, A Rod makes 30 million with 3 million tax burden, or fat limburg makes 12 million and has 1. million tax burden, or the president of the US makes $400k and pays $40.000.
With a federal budget of 3 trillion, even those conservaturd/teabags who flunked grade school can see that the schme of flat tax is impossible to fund even the military and veterans.
Hate progressives if you want to, but at least have a modicum of common sense and rudimentary logic when making such lame-ass arguments.

Dave Loc: Upstate New York

It will never happen because special interests, government bureaucrats and politicians see complex tax codes as the basis of much of their power - and most citizens are uncomprehending, or don't have to pay much if any taxes.

The flat tax would have to be high enough to cover the expenditures - and the problem with taxes not producing enough revenues may well be more a problem of expenditures being too high and not taxes too low.

Dave Loc: Upstate New York

Has the thought entered your head that the complaints from the Tea Party folks is about being treated differently, or do you agree that they should be treated different than progressive folks?

authornrf

A flat tax of 10% is a great idea. What is needed for it to work is: (1) the government on a budget. (2) cut all government pay by half. (3) eliminate FREE BEE’S for all government employees in the congress, house of representatives, senate, and white house. ( no more free transportation, hotel, food ect for relatives, flying with government employees, no more free vacations in Africa, or Martha's Vineyard ect. (4)NO PASS ON OBAMA CARE, what’s good enough for the goose is darn sure good enough for the gander!) (5) no more outrageous social security benefits, or medical benefits for them and their kin. while our service men go without breakfast! for shame!! I could go on all day, but will quit for now! NRF

Dave Loc: Upstate New York

I think your knowledge of what constitutes a flat tax is limited and uninformed. It can be as high as necessary to support needed government, and it can be "progressive" in that those with higher incomes pay higher rates of "flat" tax.

As to your point about some states having higher taxes than other states, that is their choice. Why should a low tax state have thier citizens paying higher federal taxes because of those citizens from higher tax states because the higher taxed state citizens allowed their elected officials to pass higher taxes?

oldroy Loc: Western Kansas (No longer in hiding)

The Jester doesn't know anything about the Fair Tax, but he is just like most here, in that respect. I have always been against a Flat Tax which is there to make money over and above what the income tax raises. The Fair Tax calls for all other federal taxes to be thrown out. Only one federal tax and that is the reason the Fair Tax people have talked about 23% as the amount each person gets to pay. Most people think it is supposed to be charged in addition to the income tax and what those people who developed the Fair Tax were after was a one tax system based on what you spend not what you make. So many taxes would be done away with. No gasoline tax, no taxes that become hidden costs. Only the one tax that is a consumption tax.

I know that many think that poor people couldn't exist with a tax that high but another good part of the Fair Tax is that every family gets a probate based on the number in the family and those things they must have to exist. You would always have every penny you make each month including the probate to spend that month. No withholding taxes and no other federal taxes.

I will suggest, again, that you folks go to Neal Boortz's web site to learn what the Fair Tax is about and how it would work.

oldroy Loc: Western Kansas (No longer in hiding)

I see that you don't have any idea about the difference in a flat tax and the Fair Tax which is a flat tax. Maybe you need to avail yourself of all the information available on the internet about what the Fair Tax is. I was against it for some time and then one day found out that with it there would be no other federal tax. It would work and most people, top to bottom, would benefit from it if it could be used.

cold iron Loc: White House

You nay sayers seem to forget how much money is writen off by huge corps to the point they pay zero year after year. If they had a pay something like 10% that would be a big plus to our country. The government would be rolling in money. The lawyers would be on welfare, good as far as I can see there. H&R Block would close down. If you only pay 10% out of your pay check why would you be upset over losing a few deduction? You would be way ahead of the system now which takes close to half of your money or more...

cimiron

fair tax is nothing like the flat tax, have you read the book???

adennya Loc: Berthoud, CO

A flat tax is still a tax on income. It therefore continues the power for social manipulation in any income tax scheme. This is the basis of power for the PTB.

Anyone, except the PTB, of course, who spends a minimal amount of time studying The Fair Tax will see that it is the best plan for tax reform. There is no down side to it. Take any argument you may have against it and sift it through the expositions of this plan online and you will not find any argument will hold up. Go read anything you can find on HR 25, which has been in process since 2005, and see what you think.

The only people against The Fair Tax are the politicians, who can see that it is the end of their power structure. Of course the IRS is also against any such tax reform because The Fair Tax abolishes the IRS immediately. It means they, the politicians and IRS, will no longer have the power to manipulate their desired ends by playing with the tax code. So, that means it is unlikely to ever happen. But don't give up.

Get behind The Fair Tax, HR 25, and reject any "flat tax" proposals and let's see what happens.

adennya

BoJester

The original question was about the 'flat tax'. It is a bad, unworkable idea. I have done extensive reading on the "fair tax" and find that some of the components of the fair tax to be appealing. What I am concerned with is the infastructure or bureaucracy needed to evaluate and administer the prebate program. I am also concerned about the funding for SS and Medicare for future recipients. Since the cap is now based on about $112k, what will have to happen if the 23% rate needs to be increased because of population, or war, or national disaster. And finally, convincing the special interests would monumental, not to mention getting a constitutional amendment passed by the adversarial posture of the government. This would require cooperation and bipartisan support that is sadley lacking.

BoJester

Agreed, that flat tax is a lousy idea, fair tax much better, and captures tax dollars that are avoided by criminals and business owners that cheat because of non-reported cash transactions.

oldroy Loc: Western Kansas (No longer in hiding)

Jester, you just don't allow other taxes to be thrown out, do you? Social Security was never meant to be a tax although people did pay in to it as if it were. When the Democrat Congress and President Eisenhower decided that all that "surplus" money building up would be a good place to get money to "buy" friends with foreign aid they started the spending of SS money and eventually the money paid into SS was inserted in the General Fund as if the Social Security money was part of the income tax.

If we could get people to stop thinking of SS as an entitlement which it sure as hell isn't then they would be able to see it for what is was begun to do.

oldroy Loc: Western Kansas (No longer in hiding)

I don't think Obama wants people to pay their Fair Share since he won't tell us what that is.

I talked to an old student of mine the other night who has been stationed with the Navy in DC for over 3 years and he says he asked all kinds of people, especially liberals, what the term Fair Share meant and never got any kind of an answer. I do wonder what each man's fair share is, though. I really wonder what the fair share of the man I just saw getting a check for $149.5 million from the lottery win is.

adennya Loc: Berthoud, CO

Old Roy wrote:

I see that you don't have any idea about the difference in a flat tax and the Fair Tax which is a flat tax. Maybe you need to avail yourself of all the information available on the internet about what the Fair Tax is. I was against it for some time and then one day found out that with it there would be no other federal tax. It would work and most people, top to bottom, would benefit from it if it could be used.
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Thanks Roy; If we could get more people to do minimal research on The Fair Tax, I think we could get a huge majority supporting that plan. People just don't seem to understand how it would work because they have never looked into it.

Just one clarification. The Fair Tax is a "flat tax" in that it is a flat rate across the board for everyone since it is based on consumption. The "flat tax" supporters though, are all talking about reforming the income tax while leaving it as an income tax (therefore subject to all the abuse and misuse we now see.) The Fair Tax is, in effect, a national sales tax... a consumption tax. This fits much more smoothly with the Constitution than any income tax scheme, flat or otherwise.

Like you, I really like the fact the The Fair Tax wipes out all other Federal taxes, and with them, the IRS. Another favorable feature is the "prebate". Someone has really done their homework on that idea to make if fair for all tax payers at all economic strata. Another thing, I really like the fact that only new items are taxed. Used items, such as automobiles etc. are exempt. This thing gets better and better as you look more deeply into it. I wish it had a chance of passing.

Thanks again for your work and reporting on your findings about the Fair Tax.