[Your Nightmare]

I disagree. A VAT is paid at each "increase in value" with the true amount never being shown to the consumer. Congress long ago figured that the best way to steal us blind is to steal from a hundred small places instead of one big one.

You are mistaken about the visibility of a VAT. Let me explain:

A credit-invoice VAT works like this: All businesses charge the VAT on their sales, but they get a credit for what they've paid. They only remit the difference of what they paid from what they received. This process ends up taxing the retail price (that's what the retail price is - the sum of all the "values added"). In fact, a VAT at the same rate as a NRST would generate the same revenue (all other things being equal). Here is an example:

	Price	20% VAT	Gross Payment	VAT Credit	Net Tax Paid (Tax - Credit)
Raw Materials	$10	$2	$12	$ 0	$2
Manufacturer	$ 35	$7	$42	$2	$5
Wholesaler	$55	$11	$66	$7	$4
Distributor	$70	$14	$84	$11	$3
Retailer	$100	$20	$120	$14	$6
TOTAL TAX PAID					$ 20

The Retailer sells his product for $100 and adds a 20% tax at the register and the government collects $20 on a $100 sale, just like a NRST. There is no difference to the customer. It's fully visible and there is no extra tax burden to any producer down the chain.

[You Dirty Rats]

Fool! You think quoting facts and logic will stop the Fair Tax Fanatics? Good luck with that!

Evidently none of them have traveled to countries where the VAT is printed on every receipt. Whatever. The Fair Tax has zero chance of ever becoming Law.

[Blood of Tyrants]

It's fully visible

That is the biggest opposition to both the VAT and the NST. Like I said, politicians DO NOT want you knowing how much all their taxes are costing you.

[pigdog]

But there IS a difference to the customer ... and a huge one. In almost all countries where VATs have been implemented, the tax systems have become rife with fraud, evasion, and just plain theft as well as mandating a sizeable increase in the overview by government to reviwwew everything. In addition, there are countles opportunities for the politicians to do great political mischief just as with the income tax and accompanied by the same massive bureaucratic growth.

Moreover with every VAT system despite the theoretical "purity" such a system always embeds taxes into the prices of goods much as does the present income tax. The tax system breaks down in practice and is not the beautiful, wonderful system you envision in theory. It degrades into something a lot like the income tax which is why almost all of the VAT countries have added other forms of taxes to supplement it.

This despite the post earlier on the lead-in post by SSS stating that

"The so-called "Fair Tax" has a non-tax-inclusive rate of 30%. This is double the rate that any country has found sustainable due to evasion. Because of sales tax evasion, those countries are converting their sales taxes to VATs."

Absolutely incorrect and without foundation. His claim about double the rate has no documentarty proof to back it up and was only presented by a single individual in testimony before Congress without any form of documentation (he used the number 10% - which is ridiculous in and of itself since present income/payroll tax rates are much higher than that). Offering such unsupported claims as that does nothing for you anti-FairTaxers (and, yes, it is written as one word, not two so you're wrong on that also).

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Actually, the way I see it, the selling point of a VAT is that it can generate the same revenue as a sales tax with a lower rate. I don't see anything wrong with that picture. (#6)

How could that be, mathematically?

The Retailer sells his product for $100 and adds a 20% tax at the register and the government collects $20 on a $100 sale, just like a NRST. There is no difference to the customer. It's fully visible and there is no extra tax burden to any producer down the chain.(#9)

What about FICA? Does the VAT take care of that or is it collected separately and 15% more added to the VAT, making the comparable tax 35% instead of 20%?