Posted on 08/28/2007 4:39:18 PM PDT by Bigun
The People Must Demand The Fair Tax
By Doug Patton
August 28, 2007
Last year, during the United States Senate race in Nebraska, Republican challenger Pete Ricketts suggested that every option must be considered when looking at ways to reform our federal tax system. Among the list of alternatives Ricketts said should be on the table was a national sales tax known simply as the "Fair Tax."
The Democrat incumbent, U.S. Sen. Ben Nelson, launched an attack on his opponent that was, at best, distorted and condescending, at worst, irrational demagoguery. One would have thought that Ricketts had suggested stealing all the assets of the poor and handing them over to Warren Buffet and Bill Gates.
Recently, the panel of pundits on ABC's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos," discussing the apparent rise in popularity of former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee's presidential campaign message, scoffed at Huckabee's unabashed promotion of the Fair Tax.
George Will, the token "conservative" on the panel, brushed it aside with the disbelief of an elitist who cannot understand the burden of the average worker who would love to take home his or her entire paycheck, as the Fair Tax would allow him or her to do. Will opined that Huckabee's second place showing in the Iowa straw poll was even more amazing given the fact that "he supported a national sales tax of thirty percent, which means that if you buy a one million dollar house, you'll be writing a check to the government for three hundred thousand dollars." Of course, the others on the panel readily agreed.
The elites of this country, who buy those million-dollar homes, are not enamored with the Fair Tax. They would be if they took the time to understand its appeal.
The Fair Tax would replace all federal income taxes. No more federal withholding. No more Social Security withholding. No more Medicare withholding. No more stealing from the paychecks of American workers before they even see it and then pretending to give them a refund, without interest, at the end of the year. No more saving receipts for tax deductions. No more IRS audits. No more April 15th.
Instead, the Fair Tax would put us in control. All consumer items would be taxed. Business purchases would not. By allowing us to make the determination about what we buy and when we buy it, the ability of our legislators to manipulate our behavior is eliminated. That is why the elites don't like it. They can't control the public's spending habits under such a system.
The current federal tax system is broken. It cannot be fixed. Since the inception of the federal income tax with the passage of the 16th Amendment in 1913, federal corruption and control have turned it into a Frankenstein monster that torments the people and serves the special interests. A tax on a person's income is a tax on production, and as Ronald Reagan once said, "Whatever you tax, you get less of."
Because the poor are forced to spend a disproportionate percentage of their resources to cover the tax on necessities, the Fair Tax hits them the hardest. That issue can be addressed by simply issuing a "prebate" check each month to every household in the country. Unlike disingenuous tax credits, deductions, exemptions and other loopholes in the current income tax code, a prebate check is a clean, honest method of covering the sales tax on food, clothing and shelter - up to the poverty level.
Of course, removing the income tax on corporations will reduce the cost of everything we buy, since corporations don't pay taxes. They simply pass them along to consumers. The Fair Tax plan calculates that removing the corporate income tax will result in a reduction in the cost of virtually every consumer item on the market. In fact, it will just about offset the tax on those products. Imagine paying the same price for something but having your entire paycheck to buy it.
And then there are the billions of dollars that flow untaxed through our economy today: drug dealers, prostitutes, pornographers, foreign tourists. Imagine how much revenue could be raised simply by taxing the things those people consume.
There would be no more audits, no more justifying deductions, and April 15th would become just another spring day. But only if the people stand up to the elites and demand it.
How much would the same law abiding fellow who earned his income through legitimate means have had to earn under the income tax system in order to have the funds available to complete the exact same transaction?
How many tax returns would he have had to file?
How much completely needless record keeping and other wasteful enterprises would he have had to engage in just to be able to accurately file those returns?
How much did all of that cost?
How much is FREEDOM worth?
LOL!
I do believe that the article to which you refer has been throughly ripped to shreds on this thread.
I am all for it. I hope that the organizers of the Fair Tax hire media consultants to sell the idea to liberals not just Republicans and Libertarians.
I support the FairTax proposal since it seems to be the most viable proposal for a national retail sales tax currently, although I personally would rather see a NRST that had no prebate and that had a per-transaction limit of, say, $5,000.
“The Fair Tax would replace all federal income taxes...”
Unless the XVI Amendment is repealed this is never going to happen. If the XVI Amendment is left in place some future Congress is going to pass legislation re-establishing an income tax.
Every fairtax proponent I know of endorses getting rid of the 16th amendment. In fact, the fairtax bill itself endorses the idea. But if you think that they are going to repeal it without the replacement tax system in place first - well I've heard of a bridge in Brooklyn that someone is trying to sell.
Once the Fairtax is in place, repeal of the 16th will be a relatively simple matter as millions upon millions would demand it!
Tag for later
The prebate goes to you whether you make 20K or 20 million. It's calibrated to cover the sales tax on amount of money spent for food, clothing, and other necessities up to a predetermined poverty level.
Yeah, and if you make over that predetermined poverty level, you shouldn't get it, based on a sliding scale which claws a percentage of it back the more you make beyond that poverty point until your prebate=0
It simply doesn't make sense to send out a prebate check to every single American, if they are making 100k+ a year.
If that is the case, then that is a big waste of money, needless government workers and offices.
I understand what you mean though. It is someones idea of trying to simplify a problem concerning low income earners. It is just as simple, (=spending less tax dollars) to have people send in for a rebate or "prebate adjustment" each year , a single piece of paper, rather than recycling money like we do now with tax returns. That way only those that need it get it, and it maximizes revenue, wastes less time and paper, size of the government office, because it only serves a part of the population rather than all of it.
I don't!
Because, we all knew that the "comprehensive reform" would guarantee a sham...once the pols got what they wanted, there wouldn't be any promises kept.
Now we're supposed to believe there's going to be "comprehensive tax reform". Yeah right.
Repeal the income tax, then issue "fiscal responsibility" bonds until the new 'fair' tax is implemented. It's just as likely to happen/work!
I agree with your concerns - The government is going to determine eligibility for monthly prebate checks?
There should not be prebate checks. Everyone should pay the flat tax. Otherwise, you’ll end up with a sales tax that only the rich pay, and probably a higher rate on them with paybacks to the “poor”.
Talk about robbing peter to pay paul ...
Religious organizations aren’t “consumers” so they wouldn’t pay the FairTax any more than any other business would.All nonprofit purchases not for resale or export would be taxed by the FairTax. Kotlikoff estimated that nonprofits would have paid somewhere around $35 billion in FairTax in 2005.
Not exactly - any home purchased as an investment and rented out would be tax free. The tax would become due when the home is converted to personal use. So the 30% tax could well be added to the cost of a used home, and not all new home sales would be taxed.
BTW, the renter would have to pay 30% tax on his rent.
Existing housing would go up in value as a result of the tax premium on new housing (thus benefiting current homeowners), but again, not by the full amount of the FairTax, so you end up with slightly higher home prices, which can be paid with higher incomes.
So the FairTax would be inflationary.
And medical expenses are taxed now, in the sense that they have embedded taxes built into them and they are paid (for the most part) with post-income and payroll tax dollars.
Those that provide medical services will cut their fees by the amount of income tax they would have paid the IRS?
...and they are paid (for the most part) with post-income and payroll tax dollars.
The employer gets a tax break for the portion of health insurance he provides, and the employee does not pay tax on that portion of the benefit. Under the FairTax, would employer provided and paid for health insurance be a business expense and tax free, even though the benificary is the individual? Would the portion of insurance paid for by the employee be subject to the 30% tax?
What happens when the insurance provider pays for health services? Is the payment a business expense and therefore not subject to the tax? If the insurance provider must pay an additional 30% in taxes on the behalf of the insured, what would that do to insurance rates?
It would all get rolled up and be included in Mr. Wills mortgage anyway, just like car tax is included in a car loan.
It's just the tax is more visible, and that bothers people for some reason. They'd rather not see it.
A creative Realtor will advertize the house as- "Big nice house 1,298,700- we pay the tax!" That will make those people happy.
On the other hand, you can't get blood from a turnip.
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