Why I despise the IRS.

[Guest profgunner]

%^$#$%$#@%^&^%$

[Guest 6.8 AR]

In other words, ah, you're just guilty until proven innocent.

Constitutional grounds. Now that's good!

[Motasyco]

I might could buy some of that but constitutional grounds? It seems the Constitution has become a doormat for the politicians in DC wipe their feet on. Scoundrels I say.

[Caster]

Wow, really? Oh wait, why am I surprised.

[Garufa]

The IRS has been dealing with smart-asses from the day it was founded.

To paraphrase the disclaimer: You better have a good reason because our lawyers are better than yours. We have the law and precedent and there's not a whole lot you can do about it.

Edited April 29, 2012 by Garufa

[BryanP]

The constitutional bit is probably a jab at the idiots who try to claim the amendment authorizing the Income Tax was never properly passed and therefore can be ignored. Lots of people have tried this. They end up in jail.

[daddyo]

The constitutional bit is probably a jab at the idiots who try to claim the amendment authorizing the Income Tax was never properly passed and therefore can be ignored. Lots of people have tried this. They end up in jail.

Yep. See the last sentence of Garufa's disclaimer above. Bingo.

[mikegideon]

Nobody hates the IRS more than me. With that said, they really couldn't function with any less power. They have collection problems as it is. WE have to make up whatever they can't collect.

[Guest 6.8 AR]

I don't know about that, Mike. Well, maybe I run a close second. I wish we could get a Fair Tax and send

all those fools to the unemployment roles. That's a great benefit to the Fair Tax.

[Guest ThePunisher]

The Libtards don't believe in fairness of taxation. I'm expecting them in the near future to send you a jar of Vaseline every year at tax return time.

[mikegideon]

Libtards got nothing to do with it. The IRS has sucked my entire life.

[Guest ThePunisher]

Libtards got nothing to do with it. The IRS has sucked my entire life.

You've got to get the Libtards to go along with the R's to get tax reform. Not gonna happen. Again, the Libtards believe in taxing you to death and even after death. That is why it is called the death tax.

[Caster]

Death tax. Only in Amerika does one have to PAY for the privilege of dying.

[Grunt67]

I don't know about that, Mike. Well, maybe I run a close second. I wish we could get a Fair Tax and send

all those fools to the unemployment roles. That's a great benefit to the Fair Tax.

Agree. I'd love to see the IRS abolished & the fools in the unemployed roles. Flat tax, no

reams of tax forms. Just need one about the size of a post-it note.

Too many yrs behind me to ever see that.

[Oh Shoot]

... Flat tax, no reams of tax forms. Just need one about the size of a post-it note....

Fair Tax. No form at all, no file at all.

- OS

[mcurrier]

Nobody hates the IRS more than me. With that said, they really couldn't function with any less power. They have collection problems as it is. WE have to make up whatever they can't collect.

Perhaps they should start with our 'elected representatives' like Charlie Rangel, and then people like Warren Buffet who say that they wish to pay more, but fight in court against paying the $1 Billion that he already owes.

Federal Workers Owe $1.3 Billion In Taxes

http://www.newsmax.com/TheWire/taxes-federal-workers/2012/01/23/id/425127

41 Obama White House aides owe the IRS $831,000 in back taxes

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2010/09/congress-taxes-irs.html

And White House staffers just got huge raises too

http://gawker.com/5818310

[mikegideon]

The royal family seems to be exempt from a lot of things

[mcurrier]

Jon Lovitz is a lib dem and even voted for Zero, but he says that he is paying his fair share of taxes and that Zero needs to shut up about it.

http://www.wnd.com/2012/04/democrat-comic-scorches-obama-again/

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Fair Tax. No form at all, no file at all.

- OS

Fair tax in Boortz's flavor sends every citizen in the USA a check every month. Seems doubtful Uncle Sugar would be sending out any checks without citizens filling out forms?

Dunno if it would be any kinder-gentler with a sales tax. I never got sideways with sales tax folk and haven't had to collect it for many years. Dunno from personal experience but when young was asking an old store owner "starting a business" questions. The only advice I specifically remember went something like, "Son, don't ever get in trouble with state sales tax. They are so mean it makes the IRS look warm and fuzzy by comparison."

[Oh Shoot]

Fair tax in Boortz's flavor sends every citizen in the USA a check every month....

Don't remember all the specs, but wasn't that only to some below some level of income, to offset for food/necessities? Or it's like a "prebate" that everybody gets?

.... The only advice I specifically remember went something like, "Son, don't ever get in trouble with state sales tax. They are so mean it makes the IRS look warm and fuzzy by comparison."

Yeah, that's what my accountant told me when I first went into biz, too.

Odd thing was, though, that I got an Industrial Machinery Sales and Use Tax Exemption, so that I could buy equipment with no tax either instate or interstate, and yet keep and use it without coughing up sales tax to TN. My accountant told me basically "no way they'll give you that" (my equip being computers, photography, and etc), but they did. Of course she also figured my TN income tax wrong, too, as did HR Block corporate guy, and TaxAct software.

- OS

Edited May 1, 2012 by OhShoot

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Don't remember all the specs, but wasn't that only to some below some level of income, to offset for food/necessities? Or it's like a "prebate" that everybody gets?

Hi OS

IIRC, Boortz' variant, which I think is the main fair tax variant, would send every citizen exactly the same-sized check by default. Maybe it was spec'd quarterly or annually rather than monthly, but the working po would do better if it was a monthly check. I can't recall if children get a check, or only adults. Most folks try to design theoretical tax systems to be "fair" and even-handed, and avoid double-taxation where possible. Our current system even has such goals at the basis, though it seems implemented rather poorly.

The rebate check would be the amount of sales tax charged on a poverty-line income. If the poverty line happened to be $20,000 per year and the fair tax rate 20 percent, then everybody would get a rebate check for about $333 per month if I'm figuring it right.

Lacking such a feature, the plan wouldn't have the slightest chance of adoption because classical sales taxes are by nature regressive. Po folks by necessity spend every penny on taxable items. Unless po folks would rather go naked, hungry, and live outdoors. As people make more money they pay a progressively smaller percentage of their income on "classically sales-taxable" items. Lacking some kind of poverty-line tax rebate, a fella digging ditches or a retiree on social security would pay a bigger tax rate than Bill Gates, which would never fly. Why would a ditch digger or retiree ever vote for such a thing?

The fair tax wants to treat everybody exactly the same while avoiding as much paperwork as possible. Rather than po folks having to fill out a form to qualify for the rebate, the reasoning is that it is simpler and cheaper in gov administration costs, simply to send every warm body the same sized rebate check. Bill Gates gets the same sized rebate check as the wino living in a cardboard box. In theory nobody can complain that they are being treated differently or discriminated against.

It still seems kinda weird that a libertarian would cook up a plan where the gov is sending money to every single citizen. It is not without reason but does not sound like a "libertarian thing to do". Po folks in theory couldn't complain about a natl sales tax, because they are basically paying zero tax, just like on the current system.

I like many fair tax features. The rules in the fair tax won't raise tax on po folks. It will raise tax on the middle-class to the upper-yuppies making $100,000 to $200,000, and it wil drastically cut the tax of fat cats (like Neal Boortz). The fair tax seems neutral to the concerns of the working poor, advantageous to fat cats, and disadvantageous to most everybody in the middle.

However, SOMETHING like the fair tax might work pretty good. Just not that exact set of rules. IMO it needs tweaking. A problem with the current tax system-- It contains so many social engineering features. A zillion special cases intended to make people behave in unnatural or unproductive fashion just to avoid tax. The rules and exclusions in the fair tax have social engineering goals as well. The fair tax rewards misers. The fair tax rewards people who buy at the flea market. It punishes people who buy brand-new-manufactured goods from our farms and factories. It rewards "saving" and punishes "consumption". After people get punished for consuming and they stop consuming, then millions of people who manufacture new consumables will get fired.

It ain't the gov's business what a feller spends his dough on. It ought to be taxed at exactly the same rate regardless whether it is new goods, old goods, labor services, real estate, investment, insurance, charity or political contributions. If Haslam wishes to buy influence by contributing millions to political campaigns, then those contributions ought to be taxed at the same rate as the fella buying a can of beans. That seems more even-handed than the rules and exclusions in the fair tax, but maybe I'm all wrong. Why should the fella buying a can of beans have to pay more tax just so that Haslam can have more money to buy influence with? What is fair about the po subsidizing hobbies of the rich?

Ain't no envy of the rich. I don't care what they do with their bucks. Live and let live. But if I have to pay X percent of tax on my hobbies then it is only fair that EVERYBODY pay the same X percent on their hobbies. I don''t want to pay more so that some other fella can amuse himself with tax-exempt hobbies.

The other point, is that if you tax EVERY transaction, rather than LESS-THAN-HALF of the transactions, then the tax rate on any individual transaction can be much lower but generate the same revenue.

Yeah, that's what my accountant told me when I first went into biz, too.

Odd thing was, though, that I got an Industrial Machinery Sales and Use Tax Exemption, so that I could buy equipment with no tax either instate or interstate, and yet keep and use it without coughing up sales tax to TN. My accountant told me basically "no way they'll give you that" (my equip being computers, photography, and etc), but they did. Of course she also figured my TN income tax wrong, too, as did HR Block corporate guy, and TaxAct software.

- OS

That sounds neat. You must be a talented persuader.