If Fred had slobbered over the Fair Tax, certain people would be singing a different tune.
Maybe if he had supported abolishing income taxes then he would have gotten more Republican support instead of dropping out without winning a single state.
Fred’s tax plan was golden, but the critics never read it, they were too busy listening to Huckleberry Hillbilly and his jug band.
McCain said he will sign the FairTax. He said he would sign it as he would sign anything that will simplify the Tax Code. It’s the only thing that gives me hope about McCain.
Fred made a huge mistake when he let Larry Lindsey promote Lindsay’s tax plan in his candidacy. Lindsey is a smart pedigreed econometrician with elite connections, but he is tone deaf when it comes to the Spirit of American Entreprise.
The real opponents of the FairTax have lost all debate points inside committee so they have resorted to a war of propaganda. Most of these opponents come from the 23,000 person army of tax code lobbyists inside the Beltway. They have a stake in keeping business as usual.
The only legitimate criticism of the FairTax is that it does not directly repeal the 16th Amendment. The 16th is like a business license to allow tax code amendments to fly like confetti in committee work. There have been more than 16,000 tax code amendments since the last tax reform signed by Ronald Reagan in 1986, and the number of tax lobbyists has more than quadrupled. This a clearly a self-serving growth industry that is not needed by the American people. We have Tax Reform about every 20-30 years because it gets out of hand everytime (there have been 5 reforms since 1913). It is like going in for cancer radiation treatment only to find that the root of the cancer (the 16th amendment) is not removed, allowing the suffocating pain, unfiarness and complexity to return in 10 to 15 years.
The FairTax leaders know the 16th must be removed and they are working on a plan to remove it.
As to economic policy wonks and architects such as Larry Lindsay, they need to get out more and be with regular folks, regular business owners, and get away from the Ivy League economic policy seminars. I can say that as an Ivy League PhD Statistician. We can be as elaborate or as insightful as we want to be but in the end it is the American business owner that decides to make or not make the gears and make them turn using the designs we craft. That’s why it is important to design where people choose to go, not where you want them to go. For example, let people find their paths, then design the path and lighting to improve their movement; do not design a path and tell people to stay on it else they will be fined, penalized or imprisoned. Larry can’t see that dimension of life.
Fred was wrong to buy into Larry’s plan. He should have said I will let the American people decide what is best. Had he taken such a position, his initial popularity would have remained high.
The FairTax will not be pushed through by any candidate. It is strictly a ‘People Movement’, which happens to be growing at a phenominal rate.
Once someone understands the FairTax and has waded through the minefield of propaganda against it put out by the other side, they are hooked because it is consistent, it is practical, fair, transparent and simple, and it will fund everything that is funded today. It is merely a shifting of all the tax siphoning (collection) throughout suppliers, assemblers, manufacturers, transporters, warehousers, guarders, preservers, etc. up and down the supply chain down to the retail end of the supply chain. It collects everything at the endpoint rather than in-between. And it maintains progressivity so that the poor are left untaxed.
The FairTax is far superior to any Flat Tax because any flat tax is an income tax and will over time evolve right back to what we have today. The original 1913 Income Tax Code was a simple flat tax applicable to less than 2% of income receivers.
Economies in Europe have experienced enormous economic advantages by moving to a Flat Tax. The American FairTax will put them to shame. It is the only tax system that is in line with what the Founders crafted, and what they crafted is regarded as the most ingenious tax system ever devised by any government. Unfortunately the year 1913 started the transformation to a tax system that is based on class divisions in line with Marxist populism of the time. And the last nearly one hundred years has seen the tax system shoved back in the face of the middle class (because the wealthy have better lawyers and connections, especially on K Street).