Posted on 12/15/2005 10:33:58 AM PST by Eaglewatcher
If it were an entitlement, there would be an appropriations bill, by law. There isn't one.Speaking of entitlements and appropriations bills. If you didn't think the Fairtax was revenue short before what about funding the NEW Federal supplementary medical insurance trust fund "entitlement" + 30%?
Sorry, but it's YOUR method that is flawed [what a shock] since the non-family households cannot be counted. It is a FAMILY Consumption Allowance for families in a single household. So you don't get to throw in your extra numbers to gratuitously inflate the prebate amount by hundreds of millions.
The estimate I gave of about $369 billion is a reasonable number while the $457 and up numbers that you and your sidekick come up with are meaningless.
And the prebate is no entitlement as there is no funding authorization for it in the FairTax law or by means of any separate appropriations bill which there would have to be were it an entitlement. All present entitlements (as you should know) have separate appropriations bills that pop up all the time being raised each time and dipping into money from the income tax.
The prebate is merely a refund of taxes you would have paid were it not issued in advance and it is the corollary of the April 15 tax refund - a return of tax money paid (or in the case of the FairTax to be paid since it is issued in advance). If your April 15 refund were issued in advance there would be no significant difference between the two.
Nope, wrong table, Nightie. See post #282. Your info is not correct.
You either can't read what I said or are too ignorant to understand it.
The Census Bureau works on estimates - continual moving estimates which usually have a good bit of "slcak" in them. The household numbers do not take into account the things I mentioned. In addition (I assumed you realized this, but apparently not) there are millions not accounted for by the family household count given.
There are millions of illegal aliens, non-family households, incarcerated individuals, institutionalized persons and those residing in the US and even working here on a long term basis but not as citizens. None of these are accounted for in the family households number.
So stop your incessant nonsense and just admit your error.
The prebate amount is something around the $369 billion estimate I gave. You can't handle the truth can you???
Sorry, but it's YOUR method that is flawed [what a shock] since the non-family households cannot be counted. It is a FAMILY Consumption Allowance for families in a single household. So you don't get to throw in your extra numbers to gratuitously inflate the prebate amount by hundreds of millions.LOL! So you don't think single people get the FCA! ROTFLMAO!!! You are the biggest fool!!! LOL! You'll say anything if you think it benefits your love, the FairTax. Pathetic and hilarious at the same time!
Family. A family is a group of two or more persons residing together who are related by birth, marriage, or adoption. The count of families is for "primary" families only, that is, the householder and all other persons related to and residing with the householder. Families are classified either as married-couple families or as families maintained by women or men without spouses.So, according to the Great and Powerful Pigdog, if a person doesn't live with someone who is "related by birth, marriage, or adoption" they don't get the Family Consumption Allowance.
From the bill:
`(b) Family Size Determination- `(1) IN GENERAL- To determine the size of a qualified family for purposes of this chapter, family members shall mean-- `(A) an individual, `(B) the individual's spouse, `(C) all lineal ancestors and descendants of said individual (and such individual's spouse), `(D) all legally adopted children of such individual (and such individual's spouse), and `(E) all children under legal guardianship of such individual (or such individual's spouse). ""`(a) General Rule- For purposes of this chapter, the term `qualified family' shall mean 1 or more family members sharing a common residence. All family members sharing a common residence shall be considered as part of 1 qualified family.
So you don't get to take all of your non-family household members and give them the prebate. In fact it can't be told definitely from the numbers in the tables but some portion of any of those "households" or some living in them would undoubtedly not qualify for the prebate anyway.
Your problem is that you don't realize how creepy and imprecise the Census Bureau projections and "facts" really are. By the very definition of "non-family household" many of those do not qualify. The point is the numbers you and dufus keep trying to push are not realistic as they make unwarranted assumptions about everyone qualifying for the prebate and that is certainly not true. Dufus was even trying to force the prebate onto the entire population not realizing that many would not qualify. You guys are merely driven by your anti FairTax agenda rather than any real information.
That's not what was said ... see post #287. And are you trying to rev up the insults again?? I thought you'd stopped that?
Wait a minute! I thought y'all said the FCA wasn't an entitlement because everyone got it, but now you're saying single people don't get it! What gives?!?!?LOL! cutting single people out of the "family" consumption allowance is how they pay for the marriage penalty.
A refund returns money that has been paid. The "prebate" is a government check given to households whether or not they ever pay the tax in the first place. By design, it gives "poor" families more money than they pay in taxes. That is not a "refund".
1. I assumed all households consisted of two adults and the rest children. In your non-married households, you assumed one adult and the rest children. For a two-memeber non-married household, the difference in allowance assuming one adult is $2872 versus $4282 if there were two adults. That resulted in about $11 Billion difference in just that one line item for 2-member non-married households alone. The 3-member adds another $8 billion difference. The truth is somewhere in between, as a non-married household could consist of one adults or two adults. In total that contributed about $27 billion to our differences.
2. I woud using allowance numbers for 2005, that put my figures at 2.8% higher than yours.
3. I was using the latest population numbers, that put my numbers 5.34% higher. 297.911 million vs. 282.805 million.
So if we add the 27 billion to your number and add the 2.8% and 5.34% for current numbers, we get $524 billion. That makes a lot more sense. My number assumed a lot about family size, and I expected it to be off a few percent, but not 20 percent. Your numbers are more percise, but for older data. You still assumed too few adults for the non-married households, so your number is a little low. So splitting that difference puts the current number aroudn $510 Billion.
Pigdog's only legitimate point is the population number does include some non-citizens which the census puts at 18 million, with about 9 million being illegal. If we assume this non-citicen population is made up similar to the overall population, the average allowance is $1700 per person times 18 million, that subtracts about $30 Billion. The current 2005 number for the family consumption allowance is right aroudn $480 Billion. Pigdog can't refute any of this, but will post garbage anyways.
The prebate looks like a duck and quacks like a duck. I am thinking it is a duck. A $480 Billion duck.
My number should not have been that far off of yours. I found three things that account for that.I hadn't considered that "Non-married Family Households" might have two adults. My number is also low in that it maxs out at 7 people per household. You could use my estimate as a "minimum." Your's is probably more accurate (and it doesn't even include fraud!).
I think the $480 Billion would stand up in a court of law. Trying to make it anymore accurate is pointless, as errors in the census data in undercounting people and other types of error, puts any further adjustments in the noise.
Actually, home builders are one group likely to benefit. Suppose that the FT whizzed through congress and passed with a start date of Jan. 1, 2007. People contemplating big-ticket purchases will go into a buying frenzy in 2006 to beat the tax. Anyone thinking of building a home will quickly seal a contract with you in 2006, in order to be grandfathered at the old tax rates.
You can probably build around a half-dozen homes per year per crew. So you'll have a waiting list on the order of ten years long. Thus, to a first-order approximation, you'll have all the business you can handle up until you retire.
Second-order effects will kick in, of course. Congress will be utterly surprised by the Feeding Frenzy of 2006(tm), and will pass a new law that contracts executed under the FairTax are subject to it. They will make an exception, however, if you break ground in 2006. As a result, you'll order all your crews to do nothing but lay foundations, and you'll double or triple on manpower to lay hundreds of foundations in a single year.
For you, that will be an incredible windfall. In 2006 you'll collect hundreds of down payments, plus payment for hundreds of completed foundations, which will come at high rates due to the high demand for skilled labor and concrete. In addition, you'll be booked solid for ten years or more into the future. Even clients who later renege will forfeit at least their down payments.
In the end, the real estate bubble will not only collapse, it will implode, due to the incredible oversupply of new houses. Old houses will be impossible to sell. But it's quite probable that you for one will come out smelling like a rose.
So you don't get to take all of your non-family household members and give them the prebate. In fact it can't be told definitely from the numbers in the tables but some portion of any of those "households" or some living in them would undoubtedly not qualify for the prebate anyway.
From the Census Bureau:
- Household, nonfamily.
- A nonfamily household consists of a householder living alone (a one-person household) or where the householder shares the home exclusively with people to whom he/she is not related
So, according to the Great and Powerful Pigdog, if you have a roommate you only get one FCA between the two of you. Move in with your girlfriend? Lose your FCA! LOL!
Only a fool won't admit when he's wrong.
No one said single people did not get the prebate. You've misread (again) what was said.
First of all, it's not a "check", but a payment which will usually be in the form of a wire taansfer to your checking account.
Do you really think there will be a household who pays NO tax??? That would be vanishingly rare while being theoretically possible I'd think. And proposing that as an argument shows how desperate you guys have become for rational points.
The same observation (rational points) apply to poor families getting more than they pay in taxes. Vanishingly small though theoretically possible.
It's a refund nonetheless and not an entitlement just as the income tax refund is a refund and not an entitlement (it's even called an income tax refund remember).
At least your number is going in the right direction ... lower. You'll soon be down to my estimate (note the term "estimate" since that's all all of this is - even the Census Bureau stuff) of $369 billion. Since some of you started out loudly yelling that the prebate amounted to $600 billion, that's a 20% improvement already - and I haven't even begun to show your errors.
Since you say I "can't refute any of this" let's take a look at your newly-lowered number of $480 billion. The bill specifies spouses as part of the household makeup so that a non-married (e.g., non-spouse) household does not qualify fully for all persons in it. That kicks the snot out of your fake number exercise right there. Similar comment for the non-family households. IOW your numbers are extremely bogus.
In addition your $480 B assumes 9 million illegal aliens. More definitive studies using better (and multiple) methodologies show 20 million. That (using your own horseback assessments - which BTW I haven't said I agree with) reduces your 480 by about another 20. After subtracting the requisite correction for non-qualifying persons in the non-married and non-family households, you'd easily get down below $400 B ... and quite possibly below the $#369 B estimate I gave.
Keep in mind that the family-households (76,217,000) certainly include some number of non-qualifiers as well in the form of either illegal aliens or other non-citizens and you're probably realistically even below $350 B. Of coure I've never accused you of being realistic - since this entier "prebate" off-topic excursion shows you certainly aren't.
If you want to say $369 B, I won't greatly object but as you've typically tried to go the other direction (until this latest "open kimono" exercise), but I'm not holding my breath. That would amount a lowering of your hyperventillation of the "size" of the prebate by almost 40%.
"Only a fool won't admit when he's wrong."
Abso-goldurn-lootley. So admit it after you read what the bill defines. I even posted it on this thread to help you.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.