The FairTax (and other sales taxes) is seductively simple.
The problem I have with it is it injects the federal government into EVERY purchase made. In our age of instant data mining, the possibilities of manipulation are staggering. The FairTax theory is: you swipe a debit card to buy a Coke, you pay a 20% (or whatever) sales tax. The ugly likelihood (once Congress gets busy on the tax code): you swipe a debit card, you scan the Coke, the transaction _starts_ with a 20% sales tax, but then because you used “plastic” knows who you are, notices from your tax history you’re in a higher tax bracket, ups that to 30%, notices you’re buying an “plus unhealthful” product, ups tax to 35%, checks your Obamacare (it’s not repealed yet, guys!) records and sees you’re borderline diabetic, ups tax to 45%, cross-references with criminal databases, notices an unpaid parking ticket, alerts security, and just as you’re opening the can walking out the door a cop arrests you for missing the court date you received in the mail but your toddler fed to the dog before you got home.
Do you _really_ want to give the feds that much monitoring capability?
Before you say “can’t happen”, remember that the IRS is leveraging border security to prevent tax-owing citizens from leaving. Fences block transit both ways, and point-of-sale taxation can be mined for a lot more information and abuse than you can imagine.
You are having paranoid fears understandably because you have lived under the behavioral practice patterns of the 16th Amendment all your life.
I spent a great deal of time in Suzzalo library in the microfiche department of periodicals where I read countless newspapers and editorials from late 1800s leading up to 1913 and beyond. The people I read about and the news articles and editorials I read were from people that never saw the result of a society living under the 16th Amendment for generations.
When we repeal the 16th we will go back to the original tax provisions in Section I of the Constitution. The key thing to understand is that taxes must be uniform, not uniform within certain categories, but uniform in spending and with the FairTax it must be uniform in RETAIL, END-USER, CONSUMER spending across the board.
If Congress tries to pass a law that says it can tax retail sales of apples different from retail sales of oranges, it will violate the uniformity clause and be unconstitutional on its face.
There is a lot of history on taxation before 1913. All of that history was well worked out with respect to indirect taxes, excises, duties and imports. All of that history and case law comes back to center stage when the 16th is gone.
When you study it you will see clearly that your concerns are overblown. Taking away the 16th gives power back to the people and starts the process of decentralizing the federal government which is badly needed.
No, That's why I use cash for everything.
You are on to the real problem though. The tax system is not about operating funds for the government it is about control and intelligence gathering. Just to prove that you have paid enough tax you are compelled to provide to the government how much you make, where you made it, how much profit you made if you sell something. They have to know where you live, where you work, and how you get from one to the other. They know how many kids you have and where they go to school, Where you go to church and whether or not that church is an "approved" nonprofit. they even know which bank you keep your accounts in.
They knew about this when they passed the 16th amendment. (I think Bryant wanted the dictatorial power that would result) In the words of Virginia House Speaker Richard E. Byrd, who in 1910 predicted what the income tax would do.
"A hand from Washington will be stretched out and placed upon every man's business; the eye of the Federal inspector will be in every man's counting house . . . The law will of necessity have inquisitorial features, it will provide penalties, it will create complicated machinery. Under it men will be hailed into courts distant from their homes. Heavy fines imposed by distant and unfamiliar tribunals will constantly menace the tax payer. An army of Federal inspectors, spies and detectives will descend upon the state . . . Who of us who have had knowledge of the doings of the Federal officials in the Internal Revenue service can be blind to what will follow?"