I paid tax on the income before I retired.
When I spend that income which was saved (I’m a real cheap guy) [plus my Social Security payments already taxed in the past, which I hope to get back] I would be paying again.
~27% income, ~22% consumption = ~49% total
A person born in say 1999 would just be paying the 22% consumption tax.
It’s not easy to switch taxing systems radically.
In my opinion, the existing income tax should be made as flat and simple as practical by eliminating most deductions and refundable tax credits.
We should rely more on consumption taxes (on say telecom services and unhealthy food), but you just can’t change radically and be anywhere near fair.
If you ask the average person on the street they will tell you we have always had the income tax. Most people don’t know that the income tax was devised to supposedly pay for w
WWI and it was supposed to sunset in 5 years. Before that the US ran very well on a sales tax.
Your idea still requires people to report to the gov.’t on how much you earn, thus giving the gov.’t the power to control you via their regulation/s, by manipulation of the tax code. And ss is going to be phased out. First of all the kids born say in 2017 would not have to pay fica when they start working & would be responsible for their own retirement. All this would occur over a period of a few years & not over night, thus giving everyone a chance to adapt to the new way of thinking.
This would be a shift from the socialists way of dealing with the gov.’t back to allowing the citizens be to in control of their lives. And yes there would be some that would not plan for the future, but the states would be required to take care of that, instead of the federal gov.’t. The states know what their citizens need better than the fed. [they are closer to the citizens then the fed is] The retirement funds that are in place now via work places or unions would be left in place, just untouched by the gov.’t [on any level]