Posted on 01/12/2015 6:05:13 AM PST by bestintxas
Here's my position: if you've spent decades paying SS and Medicare taxes, then it's not welfare. I realize people may disagree with me, and offer well-reasoned responses as to why SS and Medicare for people who paid into them for decades are really welfare -- but screw them and their arguments.
When I say "welfare" I am purely and simply talking about payments to people who have not worked and paid taxes to a level anywhere close to the benefits they receive.
Then I’m completely opposed to the Fair Tax. I WANT the government to be tax collector. I do not want business to be viewed as the “evil” tax collector.
Make them prove it. Cost to benefit ratio, vs. a shared leasing arrangement or air taxi.
For people whose mortgage is paid off, the Standard Deduction exceeds the amount they would save by itemizing deductions. For such people (and I'm one of them), charitable giving has zero tax benefits. Yet I still give.
Also, much of what passes as "charitable giving" to organizations gets consumed in overhead. Better to directly help out friends and relatives in trouble. There have been several occasions where I've let old friends come live with me then they experienced bad times.
What would help, for real, would be if churches and other organizations paired off middle-class members with poor families, with the middle-class people giving advice (and "tough love") on how to get out of poverty. Sure as hell, the current "War on Poverty" is not working.
I don’t want a government that decides which cost is acceptable.
Just like salaries, they are an expense. If they spend too much money, they can suffer like anyone that spends too much money.
If you really are conservative, you don’t want the government to make business decisions for private industry.
If they buy a jet, a jet company gets more business and they pay more taxes.
No, NO, no, HELL no...You get the idea.
The flat tax is still a non-starter to me
1) Does NOT cover 100%. The ‘poor’, the ‘illegal’, the ‘retired’, they still use services but don’t pay.
2) It is still UN-voluntary. IE: a slavery tax.
3) Still flies in the face of the Takings Clause
Instead, a national sales tax (at the end-point of sale...nothing on the in-between) of say 10% for all original purchases (no resale, no used, etc.). The total being noted on each and every receipt. It should also be paid from biz, to the State, to the Fed.
1) Covers 100% of the People.
2) 100% of the paycheck. No SS, no FICA
3) No exemptions, no deductions
4) Anything more is still feeding the unconstitutional size of gov’t
5) Builds up self-reliance, bartering of goods/skills/services
6) Builds more re-use (cut down on our ‘just toss it’ mentality)
7) Any ‘increase’ will be met with the watchful eye of more of the electorate, as all have ‘skin in the game’
8) Biz compliance for employees goes WAY down
9) Compliance already built into the current system (sales receipts)
10) Since States are the final ‘payer’, there is no ‘tracking/etc.’ to get more $$ from the end-user. Any shenanigans by the Fed., the State shall/will with-hold payment up the chain.
Go back to the founding of the USA. I would prefer tariffs and sales taxes over income taxes. Repeal the 16th now.
Raising taxes does not generate more revenue. Cutting taxes increases revenue. See Laffer curve. I thought Freepers knew this already.
Actually, it’s a slavery tax. You are only arguing upon the degree of the same.
It is wholly antithesis to our Constitutional Republic.
Good luck with that. Working class and middle class women will not want elimination of welfare.
What happened in the old days when a woman had little in the way of income prospects? She became the wife or mistress of somebody who could support her, and her kids.
Eliminate welfare, and underclass women will have a strong incentive to compete with working class women for male providers, and working-class women will compete with middle-class women for men.
Oh I am familiar with the Declaration.
Our forefathers wrote all of that stuff. They paid dearly to carry through on the writings.
I am not against that stand, but I would want to make sure my ass wasn’t the only slave tossing tea off the ships.
“Raising taxes does not generate more revenue. Cutting taxes increases revenue. See Laffer curve. I thought Freepers knew this already.”
We know all about the Laffer curve. It works when a number of factors other than simple increase or decrease of tax rates are present. It only works when rates are at or above equilibrium and tax collections have become elastic. When rates are below equilibrium, taxes collected are inelastic.
To take it to the extreme to demonstrate this, assume that the New Hampshire income tax rate is 0% (which it is right now). If you increase that rate to 1%, tax revenues will increase. At some point tax rates will reach an equilibrium where tax rates maximize revenues. Above that, total revenues go down because people will move out of state. On the other end of the spectrum, the tax rate is 100% and everyone moves out of state or stops working. So... the Laffer curve depends upon the marginal propensity of the citizens to avoid taxes in relation to the costs of avoiding them.
If you think we are at the left of the Laffer inflection point then you are really out to lunch.
Um... The discussion was about a flat tax. We have no idea what the equilibrium point for that might be, especially for a national tax. It’s much harder to move to a new country or work off the grid than it is to move to another state. Since the rate would have to be between 17% and 20% to fund the current rate of spending, the results would be interesting. It’s been quite some time since I took micro or macroeconomics. Do you suppose the point would be called the coefficient of elasticity?
Do your own research. Look at Govt revenues over time. It is pretty steady when marginal rates are high. When marginal rates are lowered, like in the 80’s, revenue increases dramatically. Like I said just look at federal income revenue vs. tax rates. The data is readily available.
Um... There hasn’t been a flat tax so I can’t get any good research and I didn’t ask you do to any.
This was you posting this? Raising taxes does not raise revenue. it's been proven.
This would work for me.
Almost, 0-9%-100, with a permanent ban on double digit taxation.
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