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To: Extremely Extreme Extremist

This is ridiculous. It will never make it to law.

I continue to believe the "Fairtax" momentum does a disservice to the intent of tax reform (simplification). Flat tax is the only way to go as it is incremental enough to actually make it.


12 posted on 10/12/2005 9:01:54 AM PDT by stevestras
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To: stevestras
Flat tax is the only way to go as it is incremental enough to actually make it.

If you're not on the President's Tax Commission, you might as well be.

What you advocate amounts to exactly what they are advocating...rearranging deck chairs on the Titantic.

Income taxes in any form are anathema to American freedom.

The income tax is fundamentally flawed from its inception, and no American patriot should give those who support its continuance a scrap of aid or comfort.

21 posted on 10/12/2005 9:17:48 AM PDT by EternalVigilance (Put Principle Before Party. Support Minuteman Jim Gilchrist. www.JimGilchrist.com)
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To: stevestras

Flat tax is the only way to go as it is incremental enough to actually make it.

We started with a flat tax, incremental is all it is about. Incremental dickering with the code right back to where we are.

"A hand from Washington will be stretched out and placed upon every man's business; the eye of the federal inspector will be in every man's counting house....The law will of necessity have inquisical features, it will provide penalties, it will create complicated machinery. Under it men will be hauled into courts distant from their homes. Heavy fines imposed by distant and unfamiliar tribunals will constantly menace the tax payer. An army of federal inspectors, spies, and detectives will descend upon the state."
-- Virginian House Speaker Richard E. Byrd, 1910, predicting the consequences of an income tax.

The problem with a Flat Tax, is it is still an income tax, IRS into everyone's business from stem to stern. You may want to take a look at:

Flat Tax as Seen by a Tax Preparer
by Vern Hoven

It isn't the rate structure or size of the form you fill out that makes an income tax system a nightmare, it Congress' continual dinkering and redefining income to suit the politcal whims all the time and the bureaucracy behind it that is there to make sure what you put on that form is accurate in the IRS's eyes.

 

Total Pages of Federal Tax Rules
Source: CCH Inc. Number of pages in the CCH Standard Federal Tax Reporter, as found on Cato website.

The NRST will allow every voter (for the first time) an opportunity to actually see what their government costs them on every receipt. It is only out of knowledge, that one can expect an electorate to exercise it's most important function, that "Eternal Vigilence" that is so necessary to preserving liberty.

22 posted on 10/12/2005 9:18:53 AM PDT by ancient_geezer (Don't reform it, Replace it!!)
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To: stevestras
Flat tax is the only way to go as it is incremental enough to actually make it.

I agree. With a national retail sales tax, we would have to repeal the sixteenth amendment, or we would just end up with a new federal tax. That would not be easy.

A flat tax could be passed with a super majority requirement for raising the rate, Steve Forbes's excellent idea. I could actually see that passing.

81 posted on 10/12/2005 10:59:12 PM PDT by SupplySider
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To: stevestras

"Flat tax is the only way to go as it is incremental enough to actually make it."

Been there, done that. The current system started out as a flat tax many years ago. It was flattened into only two rates in 1986. The current mess is the result of 90 years of failed attempts to define the term "taxable income".

I once heard the term "insanity" described as doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. I think that definition applies here.


104 posted on 10/13/2005 1:41:19 PM PDT by phil_will1 (My posts are in no way limited or restricted by previously expressed SQL opinions)
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To: stevestras

"I continue to believe the 'Fairtax' momentum does a disservice to the intent of tax reform (simplification)."

That is certainly an odd position, given that the FairTax is FAR simpler than any of the flat tax proposals that I am aware of, and that history teaches us that flat income taxes don't stay that way for long.

If the flat tax is so achievable, why is it that the vast majority of flat taxers don't support a specific flat tax proposal (in fact, many of them could not tell you what they are and the differences between them), but rather the flat tax as a form of taxation. If the flat tax is so politically attractive in actuality, one would think that at least one specific proposal would have gained traction by now. After all, it isn't like the flat tax is a new concept.


109 posted on 10/13/2005 2:15:04 PM PDT by phil_will1 (My posts are in no way limited or restricted by previously expressed SQL opinions)
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