Tax Codes

[WRESTLINGFAN]

I was listening to Larry Kudlow on the radio and he was saying that the current tax code has over 60,000 pages and there are more than 4000 different tax forms. One interesting point was the Alternative Minimum Tax. This was passed back in the 60's for people making more than 50k a year, but the AMT was never adjusted for inflation. There are calls to repeal the AMT. Also there are groups who want to eliminate all income taxes and impose a national sales tax or flat tax. In any case our tax laws are too complicated. If theres any bureocracy that needs streamlining its the IRS

[RogerPodacter]

I dont know much about the flat tax, although i've read about it some.

They talked about getting rid of all income tax, like you said, and just putting a higher tax on pretty much everything you buy, etc...with excemptions...supposedly this will help out the lower class more...

[AgnosticJihad]

I dont know much about the flat tax, although i've read about it some.

They talked about getting rid of all income tax, like you said, and just putting a higher tax on pretty much everything you buy, etc...with excemptions...supposedly this will help out the lower class more...

I don't see how increasing the costs of consumer goods will help the lower class. All a flat-rate sales tax will do is shift the tax burden to the lower and middle classes.

[empulse]

I heard Al Franken and Paul Krugman discuss this once. I think it works like this (they call it a Donut Hole)

0 - 50K$ annual income = 17% Tax

50k -125K$ annual income = 20% Tax

125K - 250K$ annual income = 22% Tax

****DONUT HOLE****

250K - 1M$ annual income = 17%

****END HOLE****

1M$ + annual income = 22% / 25%


(this is juts my understanding, i could be completely wrong, but this is what i has understood it to be)

Theory behind the donut hole is that those people in that bracket are the upper middle class. They are more likely to start and run small businesses that will employ the local community and power the local economy. They will employ those in the 0 - 50k bracket who will in turn have more money to spend. This bracket typically has the disposable income, which will power the economy as a whole nationally.

fUN fACT: The top 80 companies in the US have not paid their tax liability the entire time the Bushies have been in power, and for some reason the IRS has no desire to go after them for taxes owed. The tax cuts that have been argued over and over.... only apply to the top 2% of the top 1% of people in this country. The wealthy in this country don't let their money trickle down. thats why they are still the wealthy.

Also the war has not ever been added to the US budget, its always added in later as supplemental in order to hide the actual cost. The military's share of the debt/spending when Bush took office: 480 Billion. What is it now? 680 Billion Annually. And that doesn't account for the war.

With the miltary's 1 year budget how many problems could we solve in the US? If we just went 1 year without giving them a dime.