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To: Always Right
I figure that there are at least 25 million households that have near $1,000,000 in after tax assets. Heck, a computer operator from my company just retired last year with more than a million $ in retirement savings, a significant portion of which was pre-tax income savings. And it has been a number of years since "The Millionaire Next Door" (1998) has been published. Lots of us quiet guys doing the things that accumulate (actually) modest wealth. Given my guess, that is 25 x 10^6 x 10^6 of assets = 25 trillion, a large portion likely to be spent before the deaths of those who own those assets. Lets say 50% is spent, conservatively. So we are talking about 12.5 trillion that will be subject to a second, onerous tax (30%), thus the government grabs another 3.75 trillion $ from the old guys in this society under the FairTax scheme. Not bad for a day's work.
441 posted on 10/22/2006 11:30:05 AM PDT by GregoryFul (There's no truth in the New York Times)
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To: GregoryFul
Here is what Kotlikoff, the Fairtax economist said before the Ways and Means in april 2000:
So what does taxing consumption have to do with achieving a generationally equitable fiscal policy? Again, essentially everything. The reason is that the current elderly as well as the baby boomers, who will shortly retire, have one primary economic activity left to accomplish - consumption. And under a consumption tax, they will pay a lot more in future taxes than they would under the current tax system. Although the elderly as a group would share in the burden of a consumption tax, the poor elderly - those living exclusively on Social Security benefits - would not because their benefits are indexed to the consumer price level and are thus guaranteed in real terms.

To recapitulate, given the likely path of government spending and the inevitable aging of our society, our children and our children's children are in for extremely rough sledding. Indeed, the CBO-FED study suggests they will face lifetime net tax rates (1) that are 80 percent higher than those we face if nothing is done. This generational imbalance, rather than the treatment of the rich versus the poor within a generation, is the fundamental issue of economic justice facing us today. Consumption taxation can address that issue by asking the current and near-term elderly to do their fair share in helping to achieve generational balance.

They want your money.
443 posted on 10/22/2006 11:35:53 AM PDT by lewislynn (Fairtax = lies, hope, wishful thinking, conjecture and lack of logic.)
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To: GregoryFul
significant portion of which was pre-tax income savings.

I meant post-tax income savings.

446 posted on 10/22/2006 11:48:59 AM PDT by GregoryFul (There's no truth in the New York Times)
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