Levin is the BEST.
I support a VAT, in addition to our existing taxes.
Why? Because we are now spending well over a trillion dollars more than we collect in taxes EVERY YEAR. That will (and must) lead this country to economic collapse.
The debt is being piled on to MY KIDS (and even their kids, when they have them). Is this fair??? NO!!! My kids had NOTHING to do with this mess - they are not even old enough to vote. But today’s seniors are DEMANDING and TAKING their money, when they start working - to pay for their welfare (they call it Social Security and Medicare, but it’s welfare, since they’re stealing it from working people).
So let’s get a bit closer to pay-as-you-go and have a VAT. If old people DEMAND WELFARE and have the votes to get it, then fine - let them take it from today’s workers, NOT MY KIDS. My kids have their own lives to live and their own retirements to worry about, and they DESERVE a shot at it. As things stand, that is being robbed from them, every day this goes on.
Of course it is. What is there in the Constitution to forbid it?
Is it wise? Of course not. It's a tax on capital.
But I can't see why you'd question its consitutionality,
The USSC ruled last year that Obamacare was a “tax” and therefore, Constitutional. If that monstrosity can be contrived as a tax, why wouldn’t a VAT?
A few points:
1). We already have a VAT tax; it us called the corporate tax.
2). Capitation taxes are direct taxes.
3). VATs are indirect taxes and easily fall under the “taxes” and “imposts” headings. For it to be constitutional it must be uniform.
After looking over the comments, it seems a lot of people don’t understand what a VAT is.
It is not a tax on capital. It’s a sales tax, only collected at each stage in the process of production rather than at the point of sale. Which greatly reduces the incentive to evade the sales tax.
The weird part is that the VAT is actually not that different from the national sales tax a lot of freepers seem to like. It’s a tax on consumption, not income, and it is not progressive.
If we were to replace our present income tax with a VAT, it might be a very good thing. But of course any VAT will be an additional tax, it will not replace any of the existing ones.