Posted on 12/15/2004 8:42:45 AM PST by Tumbleweed_Connection
What a bunch of weenies.
They know tax simplification is a winning issue and they're trying to jump out front and steal W's thunder on this. We'll see that miserable woman on TV saying "we told the President" this and "we warned the President" on that.
The letter is crap.
"If Republicans want real tax reform and the elimination of wasteful social programs, they should make a bill saying every taxpayer has to sign a form saying they've been told exactly how much the government has taken from them in taxes each year. People would scream for reform if their tax rate was brought to their conscience attention."
***
I think they're aware of how much is taken away by seeing the gross and net on the check stub.
If you REALLY want people marching by torchlight to the IRS building, END WITHHOLDING. Once they have to start filing once a quarter and writing $1,000+ checks to the IRS every three months like self-employed people, they will go NUTS...
Make it due only once a year, the day before elections!
Gee, you think all those people that signed the letter are running for reelection?
Not quite the case.
They really DO want to get this issue voted on and out of the way quickly - long before election 2006... they want the Senate Demodogs to kill any tax reform effort in 2005 and make it "old news" by the time the 2006 elections roll around.
"They want Bush to start something so they can attack it and claim they'll "fix it for the sake of the children and the poor" if they're elected to replace Republicans in 2006."
-- How about fixing Social Security for the "children" and the "poor"?
Maybe they really want to get it voted on, but they don't want bipartisan politics.
Translation, Democrats, "Bush, you are too good a poker player for us, so should your hand right now."
2003 2004 2005
Outlays:
Discretionary:
Defense (DOD) 388 433 420
Nondefense 438 475 490
Total, Discretionary 826 908 910
Mandatory:
Social Security 470 492 510
Medicare 246 266 290
Medicaid and SCHIP 165 182 188
Other 298 314 320
Total, Mandatory 1,179 1,254 1,309
Net interest 153 156 178
Total Outlays 2,158 2,319 2,397
Receipts 1,782 1,791 2,037
Surplus/deficit 1 –375 –527 –360
the one step, step to success
1.go to a fair tax/sales tax.
nothing more than that. lets not muddy the water with cuts in entitlements. once people SEE how much the taxes are when the buy something then the PEOPLE will rise up and end all this welfare state. WE MUST get taxes off of the pay stub and have it come out of the hands of tax payers. only then can we end the run away spending and truely reduce the tax load.
"get back at the end of the year"
Get back, not here. I have raised my kids - my house is paid off and I still have the same income as before. I pay every year. I have tried quarterly payments and zero deductions nothing works. Lose money make money it makes no difference. I guess being rich (laugh here) is its own punishment being the overacheiving capitalist that I am. Rant off sorry
I think that means that Dubya is going to pull this off, and they know it. And if it simplifies tax preparation even at little, it is not going to be demonizable in '06.
Yeah, it's the SS surplus, which is applied to the defecit.
In 2003, $713B was collected from SS taxes, but only $470B was spent on SS payouts. That's a $243B surplus that pays for the debt generated by the general revenue fund. There's also something called the "off-budget surplus", but I'm not sure exactly what that is.
But if you look at all money coming into the gov't and all money going out, they defecit #s you see are accurate.
The receipts are roughly 1 trillion 800 billion for fy2004 (just completed), and estimates of just over 2 trillion for fy 2005. The deficit is not lowered by spending control but by increased income.
I'm curious about the sources of the income -- income tax is a large category, but what are the other large categories. Thanks.
WOW! Thanks for the links. I already knew over 21% of my paycheck went to taxes, but I didn't realize another 20%-25% of hidden taxes were in everything I buy PLUS the usual sales tax - sounds pretty regressive. The Fair Tax makes all that go away?... and I don't have to mess with taxes at the end of the year anymore? COOL!.. got my vote!...Let's replace it!
There's no need to shrug this off. You can learn everything you need to know about real, very fair tax reform at www.fairtax.org. It IS a bipartisan effort, no matter how much you want to believe its a liberal vs. conversative piece of legislation.
By the way, the comment about the privatization of Social Security. Passage of this tax reform bill will in fact help the cause for SS reform. The economy will grow so much that the $2 Trillion shortfall that the Poodle talked about will not be noticed. In addition, no more payroll taxes will ever be taken out of your paycheck, thereby putting the SS fund into more of a general fund, leading to easier privatization, and/or getting rid of the useless system for younger people.
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