Not so fast you tofu-eatin' organic hippie hipster, y'all need to pull over...

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by MPGranger

My point about the Flat and universal sales tax is that the rich couldn't pay an accountant to figure out how to dodge it. And thus, it is extremely fair because they will actually pay it, and the less fortunate get an edge by an immediate increase in take home pay if we abolished the federal income tax.

Not only that, but real GDP would increase since valueless jobs such as CPAs would vanish, and those people would be put to use doing more productive work.

Our brilliant minds should be put to task exploring and exploiting the incredibly complex universe we live in, not exploiting loopholes in man-made problems.

Originally Posted by Occasionally6

There are ways to adjust tax systems that have consumption taxes as a part of them so as to minimise the regressive effects. For example you could omit taxing essentials, such as fresh foods...

I don't know if that is a rhetorical question or not but if it not, no I am not "poor". Not everyone supports social policies that are in their own (financial) self interest. Just ask Warren Buffett.

I'm in favor of elimination of Federal income tax, and replacing it with Federal sales tax (this coming from an Oregonian that pays no sales tax). Eliminating tax on fresh foods is the only tax relief I would support.

Count me among those that wouldn't make policy decisions based solely on self interest. If I could have voted on the $8,000 first time home buyer credit, I would have voted against, even though I took advantage of it. Cash for Clunkers was a disaster as well.

[user removed]

If a man with a net worth of 175 million dollars who pays no "income tax" buys anything with that 175 million, he would pay a sales tax on his purchases. He would pay no income tax since he had no income. This happened during the great depression and when the federal govt had income tax rates as high as 94%, rates that could not be allowed today since numerous other taxes have been enacted in my lifetime.

Va just raised their sales tax to 5.5% and tax on car purchases went from 3 to 3.5 %. Meals tax at restaurants is as high as 11.5% while you can buy the same food and fix it yourself for half that sales tax. Grow it and pay no tax, but then that requires some effort and a very small investment.

Gas tax was dropped by Va when they raised the sales and registration taxes.
Still Federal gas tax. There are so many different taxes these days, I doubt if even the most intelligent member here could list every one.

If I was a poor man, I would probably not stay poor for long. Grow your own food, fix your own vehicle, own a simpler vehicle. I see things sitting on the side of the road every day that have value, just pick them up and sell them. Heck you can paddle an inner tube down the side of a river and collect driftwood and sell it. I waxed cars, dug oysters, mowed lawns and made the money I needed to have a vehicle and some recreation.

The problem with govt established dependency, subsidized by those who work, is you have those who either don't work. or those who are wealthy enough to not have to have income, both of which groups do not contribute to gov't operations. You need to find a way to bring both groups into the contributing portion of the citizenry or you risk loosing those who are paying the bills altogether.

regards
Mech

[user removed]

I once talked with a man who paid more a year in property taxes on his home, than he originally paid for the property when he purchased it. As your property value rises, a significant portion of that rise is due to inflation, yet you still are taxed on the "increase" in value, which is no increase. Basically with the govt controlling the amount of inflation, they are creating artificial wealth (inflation) then taxing you on their flawed policies. Many older retired people are faced with the choice of essential medication or paying property taxes. One choice kills you, the other means you loose your home.

Thanks govt.

regards
Mech

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by Old Mechanic

Gas tax was dropped by Va when they raised the sales and registration taxes.

I'm very impressed to hear VA dropped the gas tax, even though they raised the other taxes. Generally, once a form of taxation is put into place, eliminating it is next to impossible.

Some states have both income and sales tax! WTH

[user removed]

47 Different Taxes We Pay: Can You Think of More? | Godfather Politics

At least 47 different taxes according to this site. Want to bet they missed some.

regards
Mech

[Occasionally6]

Originally Posted by MPGranger

Personal wealth is based of the initial hand in life that you are given and, in time, what you did with that hand to leverage yourself into a better situation.

Of course but there's no need to make it harder than it has to be.

Saying that someone who has more should support those who have less is unfair and marxist.

Why should you give someone who has wasted what they had, something that someone else has worked hard for?

We need to be careful here not to confuse a value judgement or ideological position about wealth redistribution with acknowledging the simple fact that flat taxes in general, and consumption taxes in particular, act to amplify disparity in income.

And saying that products would cost 25% more because we now tax goods and services is simple to say the least.

We have been using simplifying examples as illustrations. At that level, if you add a 25% sales tax then prices go up by 25%.

...Prices would likely spike initially, but then this wonderful free market of many businesses, back stabbing each other, will begin to cut prices to compete with rivals.

...My belief is that human greed is the best motivator in business. And they will whittle each other down.

On topic, road systems are a bit different to other consumer items or services in that they seldom compete with other roads. (Although they may well compete with other forms of transport.) They are government funded (and so they should be to prevent monopolies).

Originally Posted by redpoint5

I'm in favor of elimination of Federal income tax, and replacing it with Federal sales tax (this coming from an Oregonian that pays no sales tax).

If a sales tax was introduced it might be necessary to retain some income taxes, at lower levels, as an easy way to compensate for the regressive effect.

Adding a fixed cost to vehicle registration for hybrids and electric vehicles is easy but must be seen as a short term solution. If you are paying fuel tax there is at least some correlation between road use, vehicle weight and the amount that is payed. With a fixed cost additional tariff if you parked your (registered) BEV for the year you would pay the same as someone driving every day.

[mikeyjd]

Originally Posted by Old Mechanic

I once talked with a man who paid more a year in property taxes on his home, than he originally paid for the property when he purchased it. As your property value rises, a significant portion of that rise is due to inflation, yet you still are taxed on the "increase" in value, which is no increase. Basically with the govt controlling the amount of inflation, they are creating artificial wealth (inflation) then taxing you on their flawed policies. Many older retired people are faced with the choice of essential medication or paying property taxes. One choice kills you, the other means you loose your home.

Thanks govt.

regards
Mech

[wdb]

When I read through threads like this I get the distinct impression that when some people pay taxes, they assume every penny is being "redistributed" to lazy freeloading bums who spend it all on caviar and communist manifestos. This is a convenient assumption because it allows them to rant and rave about their terrible, unfair tax burden while simultaneously feeling smug and superior. Unfortunately it also pretty much shuts down any chance for meaningful discussion about the legitimate needs of the nation and how best to pay for them.

Twenty percent of our federal budget goes to defense.

Twenty percent goes to medical.

Less than 10% of tax revenue goes to "safety net" or "welfare" programs. The percentages vary depending on where you look and how they were calculated. (FWIW, every one of the numbers I found included stuff like tax relief for the elderly within the "welfare" percentage.)

3 percent to infrastructure. 2 percent to education. 2 percent to science and research.

Maybe I'm daft but it seems to me that those 20 percenters are the areas where the real low hanging fruit will be found when it comes to reducing government expenditures. Of course defense is necessary, but how much safer are we made by fighter jets that cost $200M each as opposed to, say, fighter jets that cost $20M each? And the medical dollars are an outrage, if you ask me. We Americans receive astoundingly poor value per dollar spent when compared to the rest of the industrialized world. But when serious people try to have a serious discussion about these revenue streams, it immediately devolves into "death panels" and flag-waving cries about who is and is not patriotic. Again maybe I'm nuts, but that seems exactly backwards to me too.

[MPGranger]

Well I am in the Army, and I can tell you that a lot of the defense spending is similar to welfare. Every morning I go out to do PT and I see land whales in uniform walking for exercise. We have not declared war since WW2, according to the constitution our standing army should be only 100,000 strong. It would also be more efficient to combine the 4 branches of the military into a single branch. There are many jobs that have overlap in the other services. I also know of people who hammed up their injuries and are getting ridiculous VA benefits for the rest of their lives because they have ridden the Military welfare system. And there also should be zero civilians in the Army. Short point there are cuts that can be made in defense, but the $200m jets are not it. Having been on the ground, I can tell you what a warm blanket of awesome they provide for troops. But Providing for the common defense is part of the preamble to the constitution

Where in the constitution does it say that education should be provided? It doesn't. BAM! I just Ron Pauled 2% of the federal budget. Don't say that our system is based off of one by Thomas Jefferson, because he strongly believed that a County government would screw it up. The Public vs. Private schooling debate goes all the way back to Sparta and Athens. Sparta had public schools, they also didn't have any scholars, no books, no philosophies, no science, just cannon fodder for war. Athens on the other hand had no standardized schooling system, but somehow was a haven for culture.

But we need to ween ourselves, as a country off of the medical programs. Notice I didn't say immediately cut. People are dependent on the system and that is wrong. People say safety net, I saw it's a voter trap. Why won't we ever actually reform social security? Too many senior citizens vote in mass based off of this issue, so no career politician will reduce their benefits during an election cycle. And election cycles have started earlier and earlier.

I am a Libertarian, so I see any abuse of Public Funds as a bad situation. I also see the government has gotten it's sticky fingers into too many places.

[shovel]

Originally Posted by MPGranger

But Providing for the common defense is part of the preamble to the constitution

------------

But we need to ween ourselves, as a country off of the medical programs.

If an invading force came to our soil and started killing millions of us, that would be a military problem, right? With near unanimous support for a military response.

Hypothetically, what if that invading force wasn't human? Like aliens from space or something. Still a military problem right? With near unanimous support for a military response?

What if these hypothetical non-human aliens were really small, how small would they have to be before they stopped being a military problem and started being a medical problem? 2 feet tall? 1 foot tall? An inch? Bacteria sized?

We have an invading force of enemies on our soil, killing our families every single day and showing no mercy. They are not from space, they have been here the whole time and they are called pathogens. It is the responsibility of all of us to meet them with the same force we would show any merciless invader. It blows my mind that this isn't our obvious course of action.