[Your Nightmare]

8 magic assumptions by economists about dollars paid to government by businesses:

1) Paying corporate income tax to government only reduces shareholders capital/earnings, and wages, but never increases consumer price.

2) Paying corporate property taxes to government only reduces shareholder capital/earnings and wages.

3) Paying any excise tax(except the employer's excise) to government only increases consumer price.

4) Paying the corporate employer's excise to government only reduces wages.

5) Paying a vat to government only increases consumer price.

6) Paying retail sales tax to government only increases consumer price

7) Paying sales tax on manufacturers or distributors products to government only increases consumer price.

8) Paying tariffs to government only reduces earnings of foreign producers.

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8 magic assumptions by economists FairTaxers about dollars paid to government by businesses:

1. Paying corporate income tax to government only never reduces shareholders capital/earnings, and wages, but never only increases consumer price.
2. Paying corporate property taxes to government only never reduces shareholder capital/earnings and wages, it only increases consumer prices.
3. Paying any excise tax (except including the employer's excise) to government only increases consumer price.
4. Paying the corporate employer's excise to government only never reduces wages, it only increases consumer prices.
5. Paying a VAT to government only increases consumer price (and it was invented by the French).
6. Paying retail sales tax to government only increases consumer price
7. Paying sales tax on manufacturers or distributors products to government only increases consumer price.
8. Paying tariffs to government only never reduces earnings of foreign producers, it only increases consumer prices.

So, whose assumptions do we trust? The economist's or your's?

[Always Right]

So, whose assumptions do we trust? The economist's or your's?

In way you are right and in a way you are wrong. Their economists do assume all the costs of taxes are born by the consumer. But they also assume that the costs of payroll taxes are born by the employee also. And then they also assume those same taxes are also born by the employer. It is that type of double and triple counting their benefit that their bought and paid for economists come up with the outrageous numbers they do.

[ancient_geezer]

So, whose assumptions do we trust? The economist's or your's?

How bout, not using stock assumptions, neither an economist's stock assumptions nor your strawman assumptions.

Instead go to an econometric model. Dynamic, empirically based models make alot more sense to me when evaluating the relative merits of systems than generic assumptions and static regressions that tend to be garbage based more in descriptive convenience or ideology than real world behaviour.

Parametrically match a know system to historical data series, then introduce the system changes to evaluate merit of the change.