Posted on 04/16/2014 6:52:44 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Tax season is over for all but the greatest procrastinators among us. Two-thirds of taxpayers are celebrating their forthcoming refunds while tens of millions of others have grudgingly written a check to the IRS.
Either way, this is the time of year when Americans are most acutely aware of the federal income tax system and all its flaws. Our tax code is extraordinarily difficult to navigate and it sometimes seems that it's more concerned with advancing social and industrial policy goals than raising the money needed to fund government.
The plethora of preferential deductions and credits that narrow the tax base and distort the economy cry out for fundamental reform.
In 2012, the 33 percent of filers who claimed itemized deductions, including home mortgage interest, charitable donations, and state and local taxes, reduced their tax liability by $1.2 trillion-the same amount that the federal individual income tax collected in total that year.
The child tax credit, various education tax credits, the foreign tax credit, and the earned income tax credit lowered taxes by $71 billion and also triggered cash payments in excess of tax liability of nearly $90 billion. These are not the components of a simple, fair, or pro-growth tax code.
Today, Washington's most committed and powerful tax reform advocate is House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-MI). While policymakers and policy analysts alike have extolled the virtues of tax reform, Chairman Camp has painstakingly drafted a bill that embraces the two pillars of a simpler and fairer income tax system: lower statutory tax rates and a broader tax base.
The Camp bill is nearly 1,000 pages long, a testament to the difficulty and complexity of pursuing tax simplification.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearmarkets.com ...
1. the people would support it
2. the dems would have trouble publicly standing against it
Most people like a complicated tax code that allows them to take numerous deductions and allowances. They think they’re paying less than everyone else, and they may be right.
“Someone in the republican leadership should make a serious effort to bring forth a bill requiring members of congress and their staff(s) to do their own tax returns and file a sworn affidavit of having done so under penalty of law.”
Give them all a school desk, tax forms, and 8 hours to complete them.
Put it on C-span.
I would love watching the big city demoncraps attempts at that.
Let them know that any mistakes would result in an audit, which would also be live on C-span!
Reform is impossible. Throw it all out.
The IRS offers free tax filing assistance to congresscritters.
bkmk
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.