Posted on 12/11/2005 6:50:49 PM PST by Your Nightmare
"... out of their hatred of the IRS ..."???
B.S. Show me a post where I have said I hated the IRS. Dislike ... yes. Think it's too expensive ... yes. Believe it to be grossly inefficient ... certainly. Hatred??? Hardly.
That sort of emotional response is saved for lollipops like you in your "Cult-Like" opposition to the FairTax - merely spouting the same old tired canards that have been rebutted and refuted time and time again.
If the FairTax doesn't pass, it will be due to people like you who have only an emotional response to any sort of change and have themselves a nice, comfortable niche all carved out ubnder the present tax system - and everyone else can be screwed as far as they're concerned.
And I will gladly take credit for helping defeat it and then push for meaningful tax and spending reforms that will really benefit America.
And just what might those be, oh learned one? You've been asked to provide your desired alternative of a tax plan to the FairTax. Now'd be a good time to do that since you're going to "... push for meaningful tax and spending reforms that will really benefit America".
And don't just repeat the old "cut spending" and "reform taxes" nonsense. Let's see your actual plan in detail.
There has never (in all of recorded, organized history) been a country that does not tax ... in about 6,000 years.
It's not too likely we'll start that now.
If you cannot see that true spending cuts goes hand in hand with tax reform, then I pity you.
Adopting a new tax structure to get rid of the hated IRS (yes, I dislike them too) is like jumping from the frying pan into the fire. If you had ever actually bothered to read my replies I have stated this "fair tax" plan might be workable, given true reductions in spending and putting some true safeguards into it. It would also be able to operate at a lower rate, I believe.
I will keep saying it, NO TAX REFORM WILL EVER WORK UNTIL THERE IS ACTUAL SPENDING CUTS!!!
Do you think that eliminating withholding and making people pay their taxes in one lump some annually (or monthly whatever) would have any effect on government spending?
That is an example of how changing the way we collect taxes would indeed have an effect on government spending - without waiting another 8 decades for spending cuts. jmho
When I say spending cuts, I mean real spending cuts. As in actually budgeting less money to certain matters receiving more than they need today and pork barrel projects.
Congress is unable to do it by themselves, having gotten fat off our labors. So, we taxpayers have to mount the effort for government to actually spend less money where can be.
Simply collecting the same amount of money differently, as a "revenue neutral" system must be, encourages them to just keep on spending.
It's time for the fourth branch of the government, "we the people," to stand up and make our demands heard.
How can any tax reform give relief as long as the government receives the same amount of money to squander as they feel? As long as they can raise taxes as they see fit, even under the Fair Tax proposition, there is nothing to force them to actually spend less. They are our servants, not our rulers. We need to remind them of that.
Businesses have to cut the fat to survive. No reason government can't also.
How do we do it? Try running and electing candidates that wish to actually serve the people, not go and build a career or a legacy of power, for starters.
Our budget problems and over taxation isn't due to how taxes are collected, it's because of how it is spent!
However,
Our budget problems and over taxation isn't due to how taxes are collected, it's because of how it is spent!
The budget problems are a result of how taxes are collected. If we had been collecting taxes differently since 1913 - say with no withholding and have people paying in lumps sums every month or year - then the problems you're describing would not be as they are.
You cannot separate the method of collection from the resulting spending. To do so would be to ignore the strategy of the socialists - to prevent the populace from being aware of how much they pay for government. Their tools are withholding taxes (you simply get used to your net pay - there is no uproar at tax time due to tax liability - many people even like tax day because they think they're getting refunds!). Another useful socialist tool is business taxes. Business taxes are just another way to hide one's tax liability. In the case of business taxes, the taxes result in higher prices, lower wages, or reduced ROI - all of which add to the individual's tax burden. But in no instance is a business tax paid by a business - always by individuals.
I agree tha spending cuts would be great - anytime we can get them! In the last 87 years, how many meaningful spending cuts have we enjoyed?
Goverment still grows unbounded in the face of formidable opposition! Why so? Are you willing to concede that the method of taxation does indeed affect spending?
You're spot on. The collection system IS the problem. And the hell of it is, withholding could be done away with by administrative action.
But politicians (both parties) want to keep it like it is.
The 'Fair Tax' plan definitely has a few holes, but the basic premise of charging people for consumption instead of income is prudent and wise. Our current tax system is designed to put all the choices in the hands of legislators who can then use that choice to curry favor with interest groups. Anything that places more choice into the hands of individuals is a VAST improvement.
Here's a very scholarly paper on the origins of withholding. She goes into the concept and how it ties in with human psychology.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/journal/cj14n3-1.html
When you say our elected reps have "gotten fat off our labors", there's no doubt about that. You'll find that almost all FairTax supporters agree with you about that and cuting spending. That's gotta be done, but it CAN'T be done with the present tax system as evidenced by almost 100 years of "not cutting spending".
It is far too easy with the present tax system for Congress to play its little "hide and hide" games of disguising tax levels by disguising tax boosts and fragmenting them all the while granting "special favors" taxwise to "special people" as urged by their K-Street buds. Until the tax burden really is made visible to the taxpayers to raise their ire to insist on spending cuts, we will continue as we are since few know how much their tax burden really is - and some have no burden at all due to the political mischief just mentioned.
The FairTax must be "revenue neutral" to be passed into law ... but that opnly applies to the period of time it takes to get it passed. After that there is no such requirement and - as taxpayers find out how much each and every one REALLY pays (and how much has been hidden fom them) they will certainly begin to push for drastically lowered spending. They also will then have a mechanism that allows them to "vote with their consumption" rather than talking with their Congressmen (which is presently generally about as effective as talking to a brick wall).
It's a start, certainly, but a good one and gives us some benefits that wouldn't otherwise be available. Think about it! And think why spending had not been lowered under the income-based tax system. Once that system is changed we'll be a lot better off politically from a tax and spending standpoint since we'll have the knowledge and tools to do something about it.
The real summary, though, is the last paragraph:
"After 50 years of comprehensive withholding at the source of American workers' salaries, people are used to wage withholding; most no longer question it. The relevant institutional machinery is entrenched, both through its administrative apparatus and through its acceptance in the minds of most taxpayers. Some resistance does remain. Representative Bill Gradison (R., Ohio), for instance, stated (U.S. House Hearings 1980: 46) that ``one of the greatest steps we can take toward holding down expenditures and making people aware of the cost to Government would be to reexamine our assumption that wages must be withheld upon.'' More recently (Wall Street Journal 1994), in conjunction with his proposal to replace the existing income tax with a flat tax, Representative Dick Armey (R., Texas) recommended elimination of withholding, calling it a ``crucial, deceptive device'' that has allowed government ``to raise taxes to their current level without igniting a rebellion.'' But such voices are few. As ideologies accommodate altered institutional reality, as citizens' views about what ought to be come more nearly to reflect what is, government manipulation of political transaction costs provides one key part of the explanation of how such politico-economic change has occurred. "
Thank you for the post!!!
It's instructive that Ms. Twight even gave a name to the human psychological response to whithholding: Transaction Cost Manipulation Theory..
The nut graf of the entire article is here, imo:
"Congress and the president learned, to their pleasure, what automobile salesmen had learned long before: that installment buyers could be induced to pay more because they looked not at the total debt but only at the monthly payments. And in this case there was, for government, the added psychological advantage that people were paying their taxes with not much resistance because they were paying with money they had never even seen."
AFAIC, that's just another reason to dump the present tax system and institute the FairTax.
It will also have other major benefits for the country too, of course.
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