That could well have been me as I have posted such and since I am a seasonal tax preparer.
It is well known amongst our profession that it is this line item that generally opens up the Schedule A (Itemized Deductions) for the tax payer. When you consider that there is a 7.5% of Adjusted Gross Income floor for Medical Expenses (ObamaCare takes that to 10%) and a 2% for such items like Employee Business expenses, the removal of Mortgage Interest can quite easily CREATE new tax liabilities where none existed before even if a general adjustment was made in the Standard Deduction.
Add to this what I consider to be the greatest unfairness of an elimination. It is one thing if this were a change of a recently added deduction but given the fact that the Mortgage Interest deduction has been in the code for generations, there are MANY taxpayers who have computed their budgets and made intelligent trade-offs based upon this 'certainty' in the tax code. It is hard to see how this tax deduction can equitably be removed unless we go to exclusive "Fair Tax" on some other equivalent consumption tax. I will be firm in my opposition in any other circumstance.
“I will be firm in my opposition in any other circumstance.”
Me too. I do taxes too and I’m also a bookkeeper, it is amazing how little even well-informed people are about the tax code and how little the media, even the conservative media informs them about it.
The payroll tax reduction that is currently in effect, that is stupid, it would have made more sense to reduce the employer’s share. At my firm we’ve already gotten hit up for extra taxes to replenish the state and fed’l unemployment insurance funds. Nobody realizes this, heck my bosses wouldn’t even realize this if I didn’t point it out to them.
In NJ the employee’s share of Unemployment maxes out at about 20k (I forget exactly how much, thank goodness I haven’t had to file one of those forms for years). For most of our staff this is around mid-year. I have people ask me year after year why did their net pay change.
I think it was your post I saw before, I was very happy to see it too.
And I’m one of those people. We just bought a house 3 years ago, I lived in rental apts for the first 50 years of my life. I don’t know how the loss of this deduction would effect me, I’ve tried to run the numbers a little bit, but I don’t have enough info.
Huntsman plan, for example, they talk about the 3 rates, but they don’t say what income level they’d kick in at. If I’m in the 14% bracket I think I’m OK, if I”m in the 24% bracket I’m screwed royally.
I’m getting very tired. I miss Bill Clinton even, at least Clinton remembered where he came from. What happened to work hard and play by the rules? I don’t think Obama even knows that people like that exist. Either you’re some victim, or you’re rich, in his mind. What an insult he is to everyday working people. He says he’s got “more money than he needs” and then he goes away to the tune of 50K a week; I guess he DOES have more money than he needs. So, as I asked the WH when I called to b*tch and moan, why does he take the salary? Kennedy didn’t take it, Bloomberg doesn’t take it, I don’t think Corzine took it. The man is just insulting.
I also really resent it when I read that elimination of the mtg. deduction will mostly effect people who live in the wealthy coastal “blue” states. Well I live in one of those states too, along with MILLIONS of conservative, patriotic tax payers.
I pay enough in taxes, not one penny more, that is what they’ll get from me.