Free Republic

In Michigan, $8.50 can buy a decadent bar of fudge from Mackinac Island. A similar amount could also cost someone their house. It was $8.41 to be exact — that was how much former Michigan resident Uri Rafaeli failed to pay on his property tax bill for a house he owned in Southfield, an economically modest town of 73,000 roughly 15 miles north of Detroit. That oversight led the local county treasurer to foreclose on the house in 2014, sell it and pocket the proceeds, according to court documents in a case before the state's supreme court this week. "It...

Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) and Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) on Thursday rolled out a proposal for a “millionaires surtax,” amid a growing interest from Democrats in increasing taxes on the wealthy. “This is a bill designed to address two major problems of public policy: the lack of revenue, and inequality,” Beyer said on a call with reporters. “It’s a laser-focused solution that requires those who benefited the most from the economy to contribute in a way they simply haven’t been asked to before.” The lawmakers’ bill, which is being co-sponsored by Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), would create a 10-percentage...

One of the challenges presented by the leftward turn in the Democratic presidential primary race is effectively capturing the scale of the tax and spending proposals the leading candidates have put forth. The numbers regularly stretch into the trillions, or even multiple tens of trillions. To put that in contrast, a decade ago, early drafts of the health law that became Obamacare were viewed as pushing the boundaries of political acceptability because they ran just over $1 trillion over a decade. A trillion dollars! Even for Washington, that was a lot of money, an expansion of the size of government...

Larimer County property owners have received phony notices vis U.S. Mail stating a lien has been placed on their property for non-payment of taxes. The notice states federal tax authorities have placed a lien on their property for non-payment of taxes and will garnish wages and bank accounts, seize property or seize federal tax refunds to pay the debt, and to call a toll-free number --- to avoid enforcement. ... the letter is a fraudulent scam, to disregard the notice and also contact local law enforcement. “The federal government does not collect local property taxes, nor does it have authority...

I can't post the local NBC site url b/c it's blocked but Proposition CC which eviscerates the Taxpayer Bill of Rights (gave us the right to vote on any tax increase, limited the growth of the state government and mandated a refund to taxpayers of any excess revenue) is currently LOSING 55-44% with a little more than half of the vote in. Fingers crossed this terrible baller issue (had very misleading language) goes down in FLAMES!

WASHINGTON — In a matter of days, President Trump will ask the Supreme Court to rule on his bold claim that he is absolutely immune from criminal investigation while he remains in office. If the court agrees to hear the case, its decision is likely to produce a major statement on the limits of presidential power — and to test the independence of the court itself. Mr. Trump has been the subject of countless investigations and lawsuits since he took office, including a 22-month inquiry by Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel appointed to look into his campaign’s ties...

Taxpayer watchdog group: Emails show sales tax revenue going toward projects that are ‘not what most voters have in mind’..[ full title] ... A Colorado Springs tax watchdog group obtained communications between city employees that show discussion of using sales tax revenue for traffic reduction and bike lane infrastructure while other city officials have denied that’s where funds would be directed. City voters approved a road improvement ballot measure called 2C in 2015, which is up for renewal in the Nov. 5 election. 2C is a 0.62 percent sales tax increase that is supposed to be dedicated to road maintenance...

I'm having difficulty formulating my failing brain.Before 1913 we operated just fine (it seems) without taxes but (and so the meme goes), now everything operates BECAUSE of taxes.

The average bottom-quintile household receives $45,389 in government transfers. Private transfers from charitable and family sources provide another $3,313. The average household in the bottom quintile pays $2,709 in taxes, mostly sales, property and excise taxes. The net result is that the average household in the bottom quintile has $50,901 of available resources. The average middle-income household is only 32% better off than the average bottom-quintile households despite earning more than 13 times as much, having 2.5 times as many of prime working-age individuals employed and working more than twice as many hours a week.

Elizabeth Warren says her plan will result in "everyone get[ting] the care they need, when they need it, and nobody goes broke." It appears that senators, such as Ms. Warren, are excused from the worst effects of Medicare. I have a friend with a chronic back problem that needed an operation. She got a run-around from her Medicare program for years and finally paid $13,000 to have the operation done privately. My parents were briefly resident in a Medicare nursing home. It was terrible, with demented people wandering around screaming, etc. When they moved to a non-Medicare nursing home, the...

When San Francisco Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White retired after 15 years leading the department, she joined the ranks of a growing financial elite — the 139 former city workers collecting pensions of more than $200,000 a year. Most are former police and firefighter brass, and some are making more in retirement than they did when working. And it’s not only in San Francisco. Hayes-White is receiving a pension of $311,560 a year, with cost of living increases of 2% or more each year. “To put these high pensions into perspective, a guaranteed $200,000 annual pension for 25 years would require...

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) said Friday that President Trump’s decision to switch his primary residence from New York to Florida was likely a move to avoid releasing his tax returns. “My guess is that he was advised by his lawyers that it would help his case not to release his taxes to the Manhattan District Attorney if he could say he was no longer a resident of the state of New York,” Cuomo told MSNBC. “I could see it as a legal tactic, and the timing is coincidental.” Cuomo added that since many people from New York and...

President Donald Trump tweeted on Thursday that he and his family would make Palm Beach, Florida, their permanent residence, parting ways with New York. Perhaps the biggest upside to moving to the Sunshine State is that it’s one of seven states that don’t levy personal income taxes. Florida also has no estate tax. New York, a high-tax state, could contest the move.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren pledged Friday not to raise middle-class taxes to fund her "Medicare for All" plan, responding to pressure she faced as she emerged as a front-runner in the race for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination.In a new outline, Warren's campaign said her single-payer health plan would cost the country "just under" $52 trillion over a decade, which includes $20.5 trillion in new federal spending. It estimates the proposal would cost just less than the estimated $52 trillion in spending for the current system over 10 years. The Massachusetts Democrat's campaign said her plan would give every American "full...

Do you hear that dull thud sound? That’s the sound of Elizabeth Warren beating her head against reality. Unlike Bernie Sanders, Warren hasn’t been willing to admit that taxes will have to go up to pay for Medicare for All. All she’ll say is that “for middle-class families, for hard-working people costs are going to go down.” Warren wants us to imagine is a system in which taxes go way up on top earners but people in the middle are better off.Monday the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget released a new estimate of what it would take to...

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB) has done voters a favor by spelling out what kinds of new taxes it would take to come up with that much money. Warren justifies many of her programs by saying all it would take is “two cents” from the wealthy. That’s a reference to her 2% wealth tax on ultra-millionaires. But Medicare for All would be so expensive that if you taxed top earners at 100%—that’s right, if you took all the income of couples earning more than $408,000 per year—you’d still fall far short. And everybody getting taxed at 100%...

A bipartisan budget watchdog released a report Monday detailing options for how the federal government could pay for "Medicare-for-all," the health care plan popular with 2020 Democratic presidential contenders — and its findings show there would be no way to fund the expanded health program by simply raising taxes on the rich. The report, published by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, examines a variety of potential ways to raise the estimated $30 trillion over 10 years necessary to fund "Medicare-for-all," including a 32 percent payroll tax, a 25 percent income surtax and a 42 percent value-added tax. These...

Many cities across Texas are racing to max out property tax rates before strong new taxpayer protections take effect early next year. But this isn’t the case in Von Ormy, Texas. That’s because this small town doesn’t collect property taxes. Located south of San Antonio, Von Ormy is flourishing, thanks in large part to its liberty-centric view of government—an approach that’s been favored for more than a decade. It hasn’t always been that way. In the past, Von Ormy did collect property taxes, but local leaders implemented a plan to reduce them by roughly 10% a year—and eventually phase them...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — State agencies are preparing to trim $100 million from current spending while also planning to carry those cuts into the coming fiscal year. State officials have been considering those cuts for weeks and confirmed today that a current revenue slowdown means they must go ahead. West Virginia has faced slower tax collections over the past few months, particularly as energy markets have slowed. “We like pro-active. The governor said do not wait until this becomes a big problem,” state Revenue Secretary Dave Hardy said today on MetroNews’ “Talkline.” “If we do this and the revenues end up...

1. About the Trump tax cuts, Democrats like Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I., claim that 83 percent of the benefits would go to "the top 1 percent, richest people in this country, and the most powerful corporations." But the Washington Post fact-checker said: "The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center found that initially more than 80 percent of taxpayers would get a tax cut, with less than 5 percent getting a tax increase." Why, then, do you keep restating what The Washington Post said isn't true? 2. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, for years, you've said, "We are now spending twice as much per...