I "could" support a flat-tax

[SoCalDem]

IF:

the first $25K was totally exempt ....per person (working or not)

There would be NO deductions

This would allow a family of Mom, Dad & two kids to be tax free on their first $100K

Set the tax at 30% for all over 25K per person and in the process give the state 10% and the feds 20%

Also it law that no state sales tax could be more that 5%

[DontTreadOnMe]

1. the "no deductions" part is the killer

Politicians would never go for it... these are their political strings for pulling favors.

But I agree that tax reform starts with "NO DEDUCTIONS"...none! Erase all the loopholes and tax attorney legal shenanigans.

And then start out with a MIN amount for the poor where there is no tax. $25K per person sounds high. You have three kids, and you would probably not pay any taxes.
Maybe more like $12K per person. A newly married couple get a break on their first $25K. If they have two kids, it goes up to $50K with no taxes. The average family in the US makes less than $50K.

The part that burns me is the rich get all kinds of deductions, as well as corporations. Wall Street Accounting is bullshit. Companies move around assets within divisions, the Quarterly Earning Reports are becoming a farce. It has become a numbers game, and is bad for business growth.

[dionysus]

4. no homeowner would go for it either.

[TheWraith]

6. Bingo. Homeowner deductions are huge for families.

In fact homeowner deductions are one of the great reasons to OWN a home, even with a mortgage, instead of renting.

[Warpy]

2. 25K is miserly. A single person can't live on that these days

and sucking away 30% of anything over that is unconscionable. Start the tax at $100,000 and make it progressive and bump that up to 90% of anything over a million and you'll be onto something.

The income tax was always supposed to be on discretionary income, not subsistence income. Reagan the Evil is the one who thought people should go hungry to pay their taxes.

[Tunkamerica]

3. A single person is doing that. Lots of single people are. I know one intimately.

[Warpy]

16. They are staying alive on it. They are not living, it's not a living wage

If they don't have health insurance, they are unable to see a doctor when they get sick unless they don't mind hospital duns. They can't save for retirement. They can't educate their kids, if they have any (most people on that wage have thought better of it). Their housing is not safe unless they share it with a lot of other people.

Barely surviving is not living.

FWIW, I've been averaging living on $24,000 for the last 5 years, but my house is paid for and I have money saved for medical crises.

[RegieRocker]

5. Start at 60k and cost of living increase match every year for

a single person and 125k for married and you have a winner.

[Shagbark Hickory]

7. The only way a flat tax would be fair is if everyone made the same amount.

[SammyWinstonJack]

23. Exactly what I told my son yesterday when he said a flat tax would be fair.

:thumbsup:

[Shagbark Hickory]

26. The concept of a flat rate tax is very appealing, especially to people that

are overwhelmed by the complexity of the tax code. That includes me.
But there's a reason it's so complex and if it could be easily simplified to one flat rate and the current tax code completely scrapped, it would have been done a long time ago.

[Jack Rabbit]

8. I would support a tyax that flattens the robber barons . . .

!!

[closeupready]

25. Zactly. I "could" support a tax scheme that exempts myself.

And raises taxes on people who piss me off. :sarcasm:

[Twinguard]

9. What about a simple progressive tax rate?

Instead of the jumbled mess we have now, what about something like:

.5% tax for every $5,000 of income up to 30%

Someone making an annual income of $25,000 would be taxed $625. (2.5%)
Someone making $50,000 would be taxed $2,500. (5%)
Someone making $75,000 would be taxed $56.25. (7.5%)
Someone making $100,000 would be taxed $10,000. (10%)
Someone making $250,000 would be taxed $62,500. (25%)
Someone making $1,000,000 would be taxed $300,000. (30%)
Someone making $10,000,000 would be taxed $3,000,000. (30%)

I'm not suggesting this as THE solution to the nations revenue woes, it is just an idea I had when I heard a 'bagger start spewing the old "50% of taxpayers don't pay any taxes" garbage. This way, everyone pays something, but obviously those making more are taxed more.

I haven't totally thought this through. I don't know how/if deductions would factor in, or how to figure individual vs. joint filings, etc... it's just an idea. Go ahead and add suggestions to it, or rip it to shreds if you want.

[TBF]

10. If you add deductions the higher incomes WILL figure out how to use them -

that's what highly paid tax lawyers do all day. As far as baggers spewing - you and I both know that is all generated by the media (owned by the wealthy). If folks are making under 25K a year it's hard for them to pay their bills much less pay taxes.

[Silent3]

17. That's not the right way to do a progressive tax schedule.

You make the rates increases on marginal increases in income. If you say this:

Someone making an annual income of $25,000 would be taxed $625. (2.5%)
Someone making $50,000 would be taxed $2,500. (5%)

You don't want the result to be:

Tax on $49,999: $1249.98 (2.5% of $49,999)
Tax on $50,000: $2500.00

...so that earning a single dollar more causes your taxes to go up by $1250.02. The more sensible approach looks like this:


Tax on $49,999: $1249.98
Tax on $50,000: $1250.00
Tax on $50,001: $1250.05 (First $50,000 taxed at 2.5%, the portion over $50,000 ($1) taxed at 5% ($0.05).
Tax on $60,000: $1750.00 (First $50,000 taxed at 2.5%, the portion over $50,000 ($10,000) taxed at 5% ($500).

...etc.

[markpkessinger]

11. That's simply putting lipstick on a pig ...

... Sure, it makes a flat tax scheme slightly more palatable. But it still fails to reflect the fact that the wealthy derive substantially greater benefit from the services taxes pay for than do less wealthy folks. They make greater use of transportation infrastructure when the goods their companies sell are shipped around the country. Their business contracts are enforced by the civil court system. They realize the most direct benefit of law enforcement services. The list goes on and on. A tax system which ultimately does not reflect that reality is inherently unjust.

[Whiskeytide]

12. So, if you make...

... $24,999 - no tax, but if you make $25,001, you pay $7,503 in taxes? You'd have to go from $24,999 to about $35,000 to break even. That's hardly fair, and would not encourage low earners to seek higher wages. A fundamental part of a flat tax scheme is that it has to apply top to bottom - that's why it is hard to make it work fairly.

You could use deductions to try and balance it, but that raises a whole new set of problems.

[SoCalDem]

13. you would pay 30% of the $1.00

:)

[Whiskeytide]

18. Well...

... that does make more sense, doesn't it? I should check with my CPA (wife) before I try to post anything about finance.

[WinkyDink]

14. I'm against any new taxation that does not go to pre-Reagan levels. PERIOD.

[JVS]

15. Singles should get an extra 10K because they don't get to share room+utilities

[Puzzledtraveller]

19. Yes, singles are persona non grata in the tax code

Myself being single I feel the pinch each paycheck and at the end of the year, and being inbetween brackets I often end up paying come tax time.

[eShirl]

20. here's a flat tax: 100% of everything over a million.

edit: yes it's sarcasm at the very idea of a flat tax

[Bandit]

21. I am a Progressive and I support Progressive Taxation

When you tax people for unprepared food and medicine you are actually cruel IMO....

[closeupready]

22. Unrecced. A flat tax is bullshit. I don't even like the quasi-legitimacy the concept gains

from talking about some kinds of flat tax being okay and others not.

Progressive taxation. Period.

[mmonk]

24. No need. We have seen what works in the past. We're here because

the right wanted to "fix" the tax code.

http://news.yahoo.com/mayor-simpleton-223900842.html