Posted on 10/29/2011 6:46:57 AM PDT by Hojczyk
But Cain’s proposal is so very much more important. Perry will nibble around the edges, freeing valuable hours from tax preparation to be available for wealth creation. But Herman Cain would establish America as a beacon for investors, entrepreneurs, inventors, creative business people, and all manner of upwardly mobile, ambitious men and women. He would give the U.S. the lowest personal and corporate tax rates in the world, and the only place where investment earnings are tax free. To trivialize Cain’s big idea by comparing to to Perry’s small one is a vast disservice. Perry would not reduce the amount of money taken in by income and corporate profit taxation. He would just shift it to shorter forms and a nominally lower rate (but not really lower). Taxes would appear to be cut, but the amount we would have to pay would be more or less the same. He even strives to have his program seen as revenue neutral.
Cain would shift about half of our nation’s tax revenues to consumption taxes and away from income taxes. He would vastly reduce the disincentive to earn and encourage savings and investment by taxing spending.
It is not enough to undo the damage Obama has done to the economy by repealing his spending, taxing, health care, and regulatory actions. All that will do is dial us back to the sick economy Bush bequeathed to America. The diseases of the first decade of the 21st Century will still be with us. But Cain’s ideas really get at the heart of the problem — in much the same way that Reagan’s reducing of the top personal tax rate from 70% to 28% solved the stagflation of the 70s.
Cain’s reforms are the real deal. Perry’s are a pale imitation.
(Excerpt) Read more at dickmorris.com ...
That’s not good.
With Rick Perry’s call for a 20% Flat Tax, the movement for fundamental, pro-growth tax reform became unstoppable. Perry, Herman Cain, and Mitt Romney are now the only viable candidates for the Republican presidential nomination remaining. With both Cain and Perry now offering dramatic pro-growth tax reform proposals, Romney will either jump on the tax reform bandwagon or be left in the dust (or possibly both).
[snip]
With 75% of Americans saying that the country is “on the wrong track”, Progressives have started to pin their hopes for the 2012 elections on the notion that the American people don’t want pro-growth tax cuts, and would instead prefer to punish “the rich” via tax increases.
Once the electorate concludes that drastic change is needed, they will elect someone promising drastic change. In terms of tax policy, right now, only Perry and Cain are advocating drastic change. Romney is currently offering an economic program that involves minor tinkering at the margins of the tax code. Meanwhile, Obama is promising to fight for tax increases that would make the economy worse.
Under current circumstances, it will do Progressives no good to point out flaws in Cain’s 9-9-9 program, or in Perry’s Flat Tax plan. The voters know that major tax reform would have to be enacted by Congress, and that the problems and inequities of any outline would be ironed out during the legislative process. They also realize that by the time that the crucial details of fundamental tax reform would be decided, a new president would have had another 15 months to refine his proposal.
Accordingly, what the electorate is listening for right now is the candidates’ level of commitment to major pro-growth economic policy reforms, and a sense of how they view the world and make decisions. The voters are not particularly concerned about the details of any particular plan, because they know that the plans being offered on the campaign trail are not what will emerge from Congress.
The electorate knows that America needs a sustained period of very fast economic growth. Only prolonged, rapid GDP growth can create the 15 million good, high paying, permanent jobs that we need to get back to full employment. And only fast economic expansion will make it possible for the nation to afford Social Security and Medicare without painful cuts in benefits. The voters also know that raising marginal tax rates would just make all of our problems worse.
Continued at the link, above. Thread HERE.
Well, by all means, let’s make it “all about me.”
BTW, did your accountants account for the fact of how pricing and other tax-sensitive behaviors will change?
Look. I’m not saying the impact on any given individual is not important. Of course it is. But it’s also important, maybe more so, to think about the impact on the nation.
Also please consider that what you are comparing to reach the conclusion that you’re better off under this plan or that is your tax status TODAY. But your tax status TODAY is not set in stone. In fact, Obama would change it tomorrow if he could: he would immediately raise taxes on producers sky-high if he could get away with it.
If you’re talking about the Perry plan and the fact that the flat tax is optional, in my view, that the major flaw, not a selling point.
Do you really want to see the present tax code debacle extend and entrench out into the future?
I don’t.
And that’s just for starters.
What we need is “bold,” and what “optional” is is weaselly.
Herman Cain was on Steve Forbes’ campaign staff when he was running for President on a flat tax program.
ALL conservatives who have been paying attention have been interested in various iterations of flat and fair tax systems for DECADES.
The point here, though, is that Cain indeed revved up the national discussion and passion for tax reform. It took a while for Perry to get anything out there — even though, as you point out, he was supposedly well-versed in the issue since it was part of his book. But he still didn’t have a plan ready when he started his run for President.
Such a very good catch! Good one!
Thank you.
There is no abolishment of the IRS without abolishment of the present tax code.
Cain’s plan does that (probably after the usual transition period).
Perry’s plan does not.
Not very logical.
Of course, in the real world major reform legislation is never imposed without a transition period and some grandfathering in of certain provisions.
Even Reagan’s tax cuts did not take effect for TWO YEARS. This was to allow business and individuals to transition.
And oh btw, the present Fedzilla code scraps provisions right and left whenever some congresscritter wants to or finds it politically advantageous. Ask an accountant how many times the depreciation schedules have been changed on a dime.
So people need not act as though they have blessed security and stability under the present code.
And this would only get worse under Perry’s plan because it balkanized taxpayers into two groups (flat tax payers and Fedzilla taxpayers), with each group having even less political clout than today to fend off tax hikes, crony capitlism and so on. There will be more shenanigans and sudden changes than ever.
Dick Morris in June called Mitt Romney Reaganesque, and since then has taken every opportunity to cut Perry down, and build Romney up.
Fine, send me a copy of your last tax return and I'll have him do yours. Easiest for me was to use my own employees. So, it wasn't all about me it was about me and the men and women who work for me, full time and part time with annual pay of under 10K to over 150K.
As opposed to Cain, who not only adds an entirely new tax to the federal code, but also has entitlement zones to give favored taxpayers special rates and treatment, based on how well their communities either lobby for exemptions or bend their will to whatever the federal government orders them to do.
It does not broaden the tax base
It does not raise taxes on the poor and middle class, unlike the Cain plan, which does.
It maintains the current focus on taxing income instead of consumption, punishing the producers at the expense of the users.
Income tax doesn't "punish" producers. It collects money from individuals to support government services, at the point where they get the money. people who earn income are not "the producers"; some certainly are, and some are not. But they are ALL the "users", i.e. the consumers who would pay sales tax.
Not only is income tax a good thing, as income is money people actually have, while consumption is money people need to spend to live, but what exactly do you think the 1st 9 is in the Cain plan -- it's an INCOME tax. And his 2nd 9 is a CORPORATE INCOME tax. Only the 3rd 9 isn't income tax -- instead, it is a brand new taxing authority for the federal government, subjecting every business in the country to a whole new set of rules, regulations, and required filings with the federal government.
This 9 percent tax on every sale in the country, be it local, mail order, catalog, or online, dwarfs the attempts to allow states to make business collect their taxes for online purchases. It's easy to support that and not Cain's plan, since states already tax online sales, and the collection issue is one of enforcement, not a new tax.
But ANY person who argues that it would be a disaster to collect state sales tax on online purchases has to oppose Cain's plan, which slaps a new 9% tax on those purchases.
The problem with income tax isn't the concept, it is the government using the different rates to treat people differently. The flat tax and the 9% tax take care of that problem. Except if you add entitlement zones where people pay 3% or 0% based on favored status, like being a poor black person in a failed liberal enclave.
It does nothing to tap the underground off the books economy.
Cain does only if you assume the underground economy can't include laundering new products to market as used, or selling off the books.
If you owned a business, you would know that accounts do a lot more than taxes. As for Cain's 999, I would end up out of business. My business involves owing a lot of land, I pay a ton of taxes and mortgage interest on that land, take that deduction away from me and hit me with a 9% tax corporate and individual and I am out of business, my margin is not much over 9%.
Putting over one hundred men and women out of work.
I can see why you took offense at my remark, and I apologize.
What I meant, as I tried to explain further in my remarks, was that it is very important to evaluate these proposals on more than just an individual level.
Moreover, as I also said, I really don’t think there’s any way that all the ways in which the economy will change can be accounted for in individual calculations, nor do I have any confidence that taxes will not go up under the present system if we don’t get reform.
I agree, taxes won't go down, and if the do it will only be till the pols start spending and skimming again. But if we can just make it simpler of a while.
I honestly think that Perry and Gingrich are seriously trying to reign in both spending and taxes. If all they do take an axe to liberal spending like foreign aide, public( what a joke) broadcasting, abortion, the DOE both of them, and the EPA. I'll be happy.
Thanks again.
I appreciate your civil reply.
We are on the same team. There’s a lot of work to be done. But I am encouraged that the top candidates (i.e., NOT Romney, in my book) are committed to both massive spending cuts and major tax reform.
This is the time we must get these policies through!
Can you please post one of those analyses, so that we can all take a look at it. Two would be better.
Choose a low-wage earner and a higher-wage earner, and let us look at the numbers.
Everyone is curious about both of these plans, so I’m sure we would all like to see the numbers your accountants came up with.
Thanks.
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