[jonestown]

This guy lost me at the "pony up another 40% or so" line. How someone can be so misinformed about the topic they're writing about and expect to be taken seriously is beyond comprehension.
3 kevkrom

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I agree. He is misinformed. It's more like 50%.
32 robertpaulsen

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Exactly my impression. A. the tax will probably be 16%, B. the person buying the item has his full paycheck (without deductions) to pay for the item.
168 cowtowney

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Just because you can't comprehend it doesn't mean it can't happen.

$100 plus 8% state/local tax = $108
$108 plus 29.87% (federeal sales gross payment tax) = $140.26 (gross payment) or 40.26% total tax.
23% "of the gross payment" = $32.26 or 32.26% federal sales gross payment tax.
`(b) Rate-
`(1) FOR 2005- In the calendar year 2005, the rate of tax is 23 percent of the gross payments for the taxable property or service
793 lewislynn

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The Fair Tax proposal is written in english.. We should be able to agree on the actual tax rate proposed on a $100 purchase.

Is it 23% ? Or -- 29.86% ?

Hopefully, we can disregard the 40/50% imaginings of the fringe.

What say you?

[lewislynn]

What say you?

It's not what I say, or you say, or what the fairtax website says...

The wording of the legislation is:

`(b) Rate-

`(1) FOR 2005- In the calendar year 2005, the rate of tax is 23 percent of the gross payments for the taxable property or service.

Because the rate is calculated "of the gross payment" the actual rate you pay on the item(s) could be considerably more than 29.87%...

If you don't beleive me, for example, add 30% to the price of a gallon of gasoline...Or your phone bill...How much tax on tax is that?

[robertpaulsen]

If the NRST were in place:

If you paid $100 for an item, you paid $23. in tax. That means the item sold for $77. plus $23. tax.

Now, to me and everybody else on the planet (except those pushing for the NRST) that looks like a 30% (29.86%) sales tax. That is: $77. plus 30% sales tax (77 X .3 = 23) equals $100. purchase.

The NRST people look at the National Retail Sales Tax and treat it like a National Retail Income Tax. That is: The retailer had an "income" of $100 and paid a tax to the government of $23. The retailer paid a $23% income tax. Get it?

23% looks smaller than 30%, so they use that percentage.

Now, here's my opinion on this whole NRST debate. If the supporters have to result to this kind of subterfuge, what else aren't they telling me?

Lastly, we're told that retail prices will drop 20-30%, our paychecks will be about 25-30% larger (no withholding), AND we'll get a monthly check from the government of around $500. Uh huh.