Posted on 02/18/2009 7:59:33 AM PST by nateriver
It’s not the Gettysburg Address- 268 words. It’s not the Declaration – 1300 words. It’s neither the Constitution - 5000 words, nor the King James Bible at 773,000. Not even the stimulus package at 1073 pages. Andy G, a soldier in Iraq and future congressman, tells why this very important US document needs to be changed.
The IRS Code
I was going to guess that too!
I thought it was 9 million pages.
I thought it was the latest Tom Clancy novel...
The list of tax offenses committed by Charlie Rangel?
The itemized bill for Pelosi’s Botox treatments?
90% of it has to do with exotic transactions involving international companies, transfer payments, big estates, etc. This is a red herring. Anybody can understand the majority of the code applicable to themselves. Go ahead, flame me.
So, sure cut it to 40 words and let the Japanese own the US. If you don’t think that complexity of transactions need addressing, you are naive.
I do my own taxes every year, and im just a publik scewl teechur#
Dunno, it’s nine million sumpin’ too damn long.
Ok, let me pose a real situation.
My son lives at college in a house I own, with three roomates, who each pay rent (sometimes, when I yell at them).
I can treat this as a second home, because I stay there on occasion, too - and record the rent as miscelainious income.
Or, I can treat it as a multi-unit rental.
Which is legal? Which am I required to do?
Why?
Dude, I am a friggin’ rocket scientist, and our tax code has me quivering in the corner, terrified of the IRS.
YMMV.
I think the entire tax-code should fit on a single duplexed page, in a human-readable font.
The complexities you cite are, an a word, ridiculous. We were warned, by some of our founding fathers, of the dangers of “tax creep”, which would as they put it, force people to labor excessively to make ends meet and not have the time/energy to notice where all that time had gone.
The US tax-code is unbelievably, ludicrously complex. It’s designed to keep accountants in work.
The tax-codes in other countries - who also have to deal with complex transactions - are extraordinarily simple by comparison.
That’s why the US is carrying the rest of the world. Don’t know what countries you are referring to, but the Scandinavian countries have what you are looking for...70% of income. Send it in. Thanks.
Simple enough?
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