Snoopy's letter is a lot nicer than mine would have been.
At last, I have finished my taxes and am well-equipped with plenty of curse-words and other foul ways of describing our government to last me for another year. While I waded through the Gestapo...er, IRS documents last night, I realized something. A graduated income tax is perhaps the most Marxist thing ever devised this side of Fidel Castro, except of course for Hillary Clinton. Nothing screams socialism like saying "tax the rich more and the poor less". Nothing, that is, except for Hillary Clinton. How such a system has survived in a capitalistic free enterprise economy and vice versa is well beyond me.
But I am not one to gripe and complain without giving my own idea about how to make things better. So here goes:
Eliminate the graduated income tax, and the IRS along with it. Transition to either a Flat Tax or a National Sales Tax. Then, lower the tax burden by CUTTING THE BUDGET. I emphasize the last three words because our political leaders have probably never even heard of such a concept. It would do them some good to know that we wouldn't have to tax people so much if they didn't spend so much friggin' money. "But what gets cut...who loses their money." I can hear the whining already. People in Washington are good at whining, they have special interest groups devoted to whining. So I say it's simple...EVERYTHING gets cut. An across the board budget cut of 20, 30 or 40 percent would keep everyone from whining about others not getting cut. You gotta treat these Washington people like the children they behave as. EVERYONE GETS ONE COOKIE, NO MORE!
If you received federal dollars last year, then next year you'll receive 20%, 30% or 40% less. Simple as that. That way, poor shmucks like me can keep more of the money that I bust my can to make.
Flat Tax or Sales Tax. I don't care. Pick one. Flip a coin...that is, if the IRS hasn't seized it from you. They're both fair and capitalistic. Everyone pays their fair share. Equal percentage or pay as you spend. It doesn't matter to me, as long as we get a tax system that's more American, more democratic, more capitalistic. Quit punishing success with more taxes. Quit trying to impose financial equality on society through taxes. We are not equal financially. This is America, not Cuba. That's one of the things that makes America great, so leave it alone. Part of the American dream is to one day have more money than your neighbors. It's right there next to baseball and apple pie. So Flat Tax or Sales Tax? Pick one and let's go with it, before the government becomes the primary shareholder of my life.
7 comments:
Well, the first of Marx's ten plans for bringing about communism was the graduated tax. (The second was inheritance tax.) The Flat tax will end up the same as now as Congress keeps upping the top rate and introducing new loopholes. It's the Fair Tax (national sales tax) for me.
"EVERYTHING gets cut. An across the board budget cut of 20, 30 or 40 percent"
While I have reservations about the fairness of a flat tax or a sales tax, the notion of cutting everything 40% sounds appealing. 40% of our half a trillion dollar defense budget comes to ~$200 billion returned to folk.
Then we could see if the US citizenry would step up to make up the difference to help make up the difference in the ~$8 billion lost in welfare assistance.
AND AN AMEN TO THAT! I am telling you.. Because of sales tax, withholding tax, federal tax and state tax, our small business couldn't survive and we are STILL paying for it. WE also had some crooked employees, but that is not the point.. I remember how our quarterly taxes really sucked. This is what the nimrods who sit at home and drink the koolaide don't get.. Small business' ON PAPER usually are up in the 'rich people category' at least according to the koolaide drinkers.. BUT, by the time you pay employees, debt, overhead etc.. You could end up with zero to negative profit, yet on your TAX forms it doesn't take into account what you had to pay... SO.. let's say you made $100k in a year.. You will get taxed on that amount.
We got raped personally this year with taxes, so I agree with you.. It is ridiculous, and the middle income earners, not the rich, are the ones getting burned. Every time I see Reid, Hitlery and Pelosi on T.V. spouting their lying crap about the rich getting a tax break with Bush' tax cuts, I get so mad watching them lie like that. When Bush gave his cuts, AND GOT RID OF THAT RIDICULOUS CLINTON MARRIAGE PENALTY TAX, AND WE GOT A $1000 PER CHILD DEDUCTION, we finally started recovering from the Clinton onslaught of taxes.. I remember how hard it was for us back in the Clinton years. If you are a family who has more than 1.5 children and one of the parents stays home, under the libs' tax plan you get raped with taxes.
But getting back to your suggestion... YES FLAT TAX OR SALES TAX!! I am all for it and so are most middle income Americans.. even the libs, but it would take us doing it before they would agree to it. I swear, the democratic party is going to ruin our country.
SOrry, but taxes is a sore subject with me.. sorry for ranting..
I don't think that there's ANYTHING wrong with the flat tax proposals that are floating around. It seems to me that the return of X dollars per family member in the form of a rebate (having paid taxes throughout the year on goods/services purchased) isn't such a bad thing.
Having more money every two weeks is EXACTLY what most Americans should be looking for...and far, far less in the form of handouts from the government.
I'm not saying that I'm in favor of returning to the age of Debtors' prisons...but when you think about it, why should WE work our butts off to provide for the 10-20% that choose to sponge off the gubment.
Time to put these folks to work to EARN what they get. The days of sitting at home in front of a tv bigger than mine waiting for the "Almighty Check" should be relegated to the ash heap of history!
Clear enough?
See you on the high ground.
MajorDad1984
"but when you think about it, why should WE work our butts off to provide for the 10-20% that choose to sponge off the gubment."
I've a friend who was manic depressive and bi-polar. He'd work when he could (when he wasn't so depressed that he couldn't get out of bed), but was out of work a good bit of the time. Before his illness kicked in, he was a cadet at the naval academy, from an wealthy and important family and going places.
Afterwards, he was fairly dependent upon his family until his behavior got bad enough that they cut off the support, and then he was dependent upon the gubment and our tax dollars. His support from the gubment was spotty and eventually, while off his meds, he killed himself.
I've another friend who was severely abused as a child and developed severe phobias and anxiety attacks as an adult. She worked when she could but often was dependent upon the gubment and charities for support. She is an honest person who tries her hardest, but her illnesses have set her back and it's difficult to get beyond that.
These "loafers" of which you speak are for the most part people with issues who are trying with the help of God, their families and friends, to get by. But even with that, without government assistance, they would be on the streets, in prison, not contributing and costing society more than the money we spend currently. It's a fiscally responsible thing to assist the needy, to avoid bigger costs down the road.
Seems to me.
Dan, great stories and sad indeed, however, your friends only account for maybe 2% of all the sluff-offs. Should we cater to the 2%?
You're basing your 2% upon what sources?
I've worked in the mental health field, my wife's a social worker, our home and church are in poor neighborhoods and we deal with these issues daily.
Are there some cheaters/scammers? Sure. I see them on occasion, too. But they are the minority.
There is simply not a vast lazy underground cheating the gov't out of billions of dollars so they can live a life of ease while we all work. That is the myth.
That's why I wrote of my experience - because it is, statistically, verifiably, the norm. Sure we can all tell a story about a "friend of my wife's cousin who was getting rich off welfare, driving a cadillac and buying drugs." But again, that is the exception. Many people are angry at the system based on misinformation about who is and isn't being helped.
But if you have evidence to the contrary, please educate us all.
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