I have no problem with this. I DO NOT cheat on my taxes (although I take every legal deduction I am entitled to). If everyone else (especially the very rich), did not cheat then the rest of us could pay less. Do I wish I could pay less taxes? Of course. But I do feel priviledged to live in the best country in the world? Yes, I do.
And, of course, you have proof that 'everyone else' cheats on their taxes "(especially the very rich)"?
They take every LEGAL deduction they are entitled to also but the IRS may not interrupt it as 'legal' because they have IRS agents who are CLUELESS!
You ‘should’ have a problem and you likely ‘would’ have a problem with this, if you thought further, especially if you knew tax history and how these things in history get played out.
What has happened in the past and always happens because government is predictable in these things is outlined as follows:
1. The government chooses a new tax target. First it always chooses the ‘rich’ however ‘rich’ is defined at the time and however it becomes defined under changing policy.
2. After choosing a target of ‘rich’, the government asks newly assembled employees and contractors to submit plans and goals for how much revenue can be recovered hypothetically under the new target program. The employees/contractors will submit estimates and goals that are far too high and overreaching. If the submitted estimates/goals are too low for policy makers, then the plans will be sent back for further review, with instructions for changes, inclusions etc. until the numbers are in line with what policy makers want to hear. In other words, total recovery estimates will be fudged based on how large a task force is wanted by policy makers.
3. Once recovery estimates are acceptable to policy makers, a compliance task force of government and contractors will be funded based on a percentage of the recovery estimate.
3a.This force is assembled and paid for based on estimates that are unrealistically high for recovery.
3b. As a side note, the government has in at least the last ten years posited the existence of a $300 billion ‘tax gap’. Study after study has estimated that it would cost almost as much to close the gap through enforcement, because it would require enormous manpower to monitor and audit millions and millions of small businesses, and to fund litigation in courts. And that’s not to mention the intrusiveness that would occur or the validity of the assumptions that the accuracy of the tax gap is based on.
3c. So we need to keep in mind that the government is going to spend an enormous amount of money in an attempt to recover an unrealistically high amount of tax revenue. This is not a speculation, it is based on similar tax compliance campaigns in the past. That is why every new tax compliance program has a ‘settlement’ provision in order to try and limit the cost of recovery on a case by case basis. But the government is hugely inefficient, so whatever it may profit in a negotiated settlement is quickly swallowed up by other cases that turn up nothing, or as often occurs a refund owed taxpayers.
4. A new campaign to assemble a tax task force to go after the ‘rich’ is nothing new. Previous efforts result in more tax expats and more capital flow offshore with different evolving structures to shield owners from confiscation of their capital. Each tax task force in the past has never been successful in meeting its original goals. In fact, the efforts have complicated matters and made them worse.
5. (IMPORTANT) Invariably once a tax task force has reached a point of diminishing returns (normally in 1 - 3 years). the task force is not dissolved but is redirected for other policy enforcement programs. This means the army of tax enforcers is turned away from its focus on the ‘rich’ and is turned toward new targets defined by policy makers. You should be able to infer who the new targets are. If the new targets are not ‘rich’, then what are they? They are always a new definition of ‘rich’ and they are likely to be your neighbor.
In sum, if you think the present tax system is sustainable as your comments indicate, then you should explain to us how you think the government will not:
1) raise our taxes in the future to close a $1.4 Trillion deficit or,
2) devalue our dollar so that our purchasing power will not allow us to buy a bag of groceries at 50% of today’s prices or,
3) severely cut or tax our retirement benefits or,
4) limit our health coverage to control costs.
If you think that tax policy needs reform, then please tell us how you think it needs to be reformed.
By the way, there exists a new tax code proposal that is the most researched tax system proposal ever made and is endorsed by prize winning economists, actuaries and academics. It will result in a voluntary return of the $11 trillion that has fled offshore and will revive American export competitiveness. It will also be simple and much easier to enforce.
The problem with this new tax code is that it will take away the present power of policy makers to choose targets, to choose winners and losers, to punish their ideological adversaries and reward their supporters. In short, the new tax code will put an end to the tax gaming industry that resides in the many tax lobbying firms with revolving doors between themselves and Congress. Because to these people, the present tax code provides a good smoke screen to their corrupt practices, and these practices are to them a growth industry. Because this new tax code threatens the tax gamers, the gamers have ridiculed the new tax code and attempted to obstruct it from gaining support. The gamers have had limited success with stopping the new tax code in the halls of Congress but they are failing with the grass roots.