Fair Tax

[wind_magic]

They are talking about a bill in the U.S. Congress to replace the income tax w/ the "fair tax" that is in essence a national sales tax just like the sales tax we already pay when we buy stuff except, well, a lot bigger.

Are you for it or against it ?

Info about the bill in Wikipedia.
Activist website http://www.fairtax.org/ (Biased)

[edited to include links]
[edited a second time for cam to change "a" to "the"]

[sailaway21]

I'll vote for almost anything that put's IRS employees in the soup lines and eliminates progressivity. Savings will increase with the fair tax plan, too.

[Artwerke]

As much as I'm in favor of the idea, I think it's a ploy to tax the boomers on what they spend just as our tax rates are headed down at retirement. I mean tax defered 401Ks pay out but now the sales tax will be thru the roof. Art.

[PBzeer]

Fair tax is an oxymoron. If they want to change, just go to a plain simple flat tax. Everyone pays the same percentage. No loopholes, no deductions, just a simple flat percentage. What could be fairer than that?

[sailingdog]

Simplifying the tax code and eliminating the ability to use loopholes to get out of paying a good portion of ones taxes would go a long way to making the system much fairer. Make it a flat percentage...regardless of income—and get rid of most of the IRS people.

Also, while you're at it... get rid of the US Congressional pensions and pensions for the other government officials—they should go on Social Security like the great unwashed masses.

[Valiente]

They just lowered the federal sales tax here from 7% to 6% and last week to 5%, along with some token income tax cuts. Frankly, I think this is ass-backwards economics. The sales tax taxes sales *equally* and took in vast amounts of money, whereas a tax cut in income tax would leave more discretionary income in our collective pockets.

[sailingdog]

Sales taxes, especially those on food and other necessities, tend to be regressive in nature, since lower income families tend to spend a greater proportion of their income on these items.

Originally Posted by Valiente

They just lowered the federal sales tax here from 7% to 6% and last week to 5%, along with some token income tax cuts. Frankly, I think this is ass-backwards economics. The sales tax taxes sales *equally* and took in vast amounts of money, whereas a tax cut in income tax would leave more discretionary income in our collective pockets.

[camaraderie]

THE fair tax bill...rather than A fair tax bill, is actually a very well thought out and well researched proposal for eliminating the income tax, the IRS and all the gobbledygook regulation we have now. It would among other things...eliminate a lot of the lobbyist generated favoritism in our present tax structure AND get us income from those 20 million illegals that are sending money "home" each month without any taxes.
It has been a favored proposal of LIBERTARIAN thinkers for some years now and actively promoted by radio personality Neal Boortz who has written some books on the effects of such a system. http://boortz.com/

Obviously, such a radical change to tax structure AND the beauracracy will not happen any time soon, but the movement has gained a bit of strength in the last few years. It is also obviously easy to attack the plan on the details and yell about how this group or that group will be adversely affected in easily digested sound bites. I would urge anyone who thinks our present tax structure is nuts and unfair to seriously read up on this ENTIRE proposal as I don't think it is possible to understand all the implications or answer the critics without doing so.
The FairTax, has been endorsed by John McCain and Fred Thompson,Mike Huckabee, Tom Tancredo, Duncan Hunter, and Democrat Mike Gravel.
There is LOTS of good reading on www.fairtax.org.
I do think that this is one issue on which both average republicans and democrats (as opposed to politicians) can find common ground and make some fundamental changes which will be of benefit to the country. Thanks for bringing this up Windy!!

PS...since the proposal is tax revenue neutral...it really doesn't fix the big problem...government spending!!

[Giulietta]

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

We, overtaxed Europeans, now listen to you guys and laugh....you're digging a deeper and deeper hole...carry on as it goes and soon, the Mexicans will govern the US....

I saw on the news yesterday, your congress wants to reduce work time??

Is this true??? For real??? What the hell is wrong?? your economy is dead, and now they want to cut work times?? The only thing that keeps you guys going is the fact that Americans work well...hard and do it many hours a week...

What's wrong with you people??? Why you guys allow these things to happen???

What "inteligent" Country, via a vis an all time economical crisis comes publically pass the message all is good, and in fact...it so good we're cutting down in the work time....WTF????? Is someone set on destryong the USA from the inside out???

You guy rebeled in the 1775....do it again....

[sailingdog]

Originally Posted by camaraderie

PS...since the proposal is tax revenue neutral...it really doesn't fix the big problem...government spending!!

Very good point... how much are we spending on the military currently???