The real problem is spending. Cut federal expenditures to the point that they would consume less than 10% of sales and I think the NRST might be workable.
Brilliant, no why hasn't any one been able to do that in the last 92 years the income tax system has been in place?
Bush touts relief as tax day looms
Another 3.9 million Americans will have their income tax liability completely eliminated, officials said.
That's 3.9 million Americans more added to the spending constituency of 70% of the public clamoring for more from government, figuring someone else to foots the bill.
The Honorable James DeMint (R-SC)
United States House of Representatives
APRIL 5, 2001
- "There has been a shift in the relationship between individuals and government, he argues, such that fewer and fewer are paying taxes at the same time that more and more are receiving increasingly generous benefits. If it becomes the case that most voters do not bear a financial burden for this largess, then there will be little to restrain--and significant political incentives to encourage--the continued growth of government.
It's like me in the restaurant: What do I care about extravagance if you're footing the bill?
--- Walter Williams
if you ask a Canadian how much they like the GST, it's best to don a riot helmet first.
Strange how a visible tax that everyone knowingly participates in paying does that to an electorate isn't it?
- It is a signal advantage of taxes on articles of consumption, that they contain in their own nature a security against excess. They prescribe their own limit; which cannot be exceeded without defeating the end proposed, that is, an extension of the revenue. ... Impositions of this kind usually fall under the denomination of indirect taxes, and must for a long time constitute the chief part of the revenue raised in this country.
At least I did something to design a system whereby much of that need will be eliminated. What's your contribution?
As I said, I have no problem with an NRST in principle, but the enforcement requirements in a nation that can't seem to stem the flow of illegal drugs scare me. California already exempts many goods from its sales tax and the machinations around what is "food," for example, and what isn't are amazing. What makes anybody here think that a sales tax will be any less subject to patronage, complex tweaks, byzantine accounting, and outright corruption when the difference is an automatic 25-35% advantage for your product (when state sales taxes are factored in) I don't know.