[News] Gov. Perry propose flat tax.

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C

Chibibar

http://news.yahoo.com/rick-perrys-economic-fix-20-flat-tax-cap-022547777.html

The plan starts with giving Americans a choice between a new, flat tax rate of 20 percent or their current income tax rate,” Perry writes. “The new flat tax preserves mortgage interest, charitable and state and local tax exemptions for families earning less than $500,000 annually, and it increases the standard deduction to $12,500 for individuals and dependents.”

hmm. This is a different flat tax that we forumite have talk about. Is he proposing income flat tax?


 
strawman

strawman

Dave said:
Flat. Taxes. Don't. Work.

Say it with me, you fiscally ignorant dipshits.
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Why don't they work?

I can see a lot of problems with his particular plan, but why are you claiming that flat taxes don't work? Assuming, of course, that there are no taxes below a certain income (ie, low and no income households are not taxed) then what is wrong with a flat tax for those above the poverty level?
 
C

Chibibar

Dave said:
Because even though the taxes are a proportion of income, because of costs of living, the flat tax punishes the lesser incomes.

Let me find some studies to back me up.
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But what about the post about prebate and stuff, would that work?

but all I see is empty promises, but it is interesting to see a proposal for it. I mean if you cut ALL taxes out and slap on Federal Flat tax, +state flat tax, and +city flat tax, add prebate for income below X dollars and taxes only tax upon spending.

Too simple to work? ;)
 
sixpackshaker

sixpackshaker

A flat tax with exemptions will not work. I always considered the goal of a flat tax was to present a clear tax-code, with a low enough tax rate that would make exemptions unnecessary. Low enough to bring tax cheats into the fold too. Then by cutting out bureaucracy and bringing in nearly the same funds as before... save enough money to offset the percentage loss in the tax code.
 
strawman

strawman

Lots of democrats support tax plans that don't tax investment income. Beyond that, how is a flat tax "vastly favoring" the wealthy? Again, assuming that there are no taxes for those below a certain income level (or rebates, or whatever mechanism you want).
 
C

Chibibar

stienman said:
Lots of democrats support tax plans that don't tax investment income. Beyond that, how is a flat tax "vastly favoring" the wealthy? Again, assuming that there are no taxes for those below a certain income level (or rebates, or whatever mechanism you want).
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Well, if you are going income level (instead of sale flat tax to cover all that is what I was proposing) what about Steve Jobs' income? he get paid $1 a year officially. So his income is $1 per year. That is well below the income level.

That is why I personally think of putting all into sales tax. Regardless how much money you MAKE, you have to pay taxes on stuff you buy (now granted tax exempt for business and religious places are iffy, but I say no exception. It is like with NuSkin, when you order products from the HQ, you pay the RETAIL value in Tax to them so you can recoup it when you actually sell the product and the business file the taxes directly to the government.
 
strawman

strawman

Chibibar said:
Well, if you are going income level (instead of sale flat tax to cover all that is what I was proposing) what about Steve Jobs' income? he get paid $1 a year officially. So his income is $1 per year. That is well below the income level.
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That has nothing to do with a flat tax, though, and everything to do with not taxing investment income.

Personally, I think income is income, investment or otherwise, so it should all be taxed.

Those that back no or low investment taxes claim that they are spurring job growth by encouraging people with a ton of money to keep it in companies, and not in assets/banks/mattress/etc. I'm certain that taxing investment income would discourage investing - but I'm not convinced that not taxing it is actually creating jobs either.

I'd put a tax on investment income that wasn't re-invested. If you take a dividend and use it to invest in another company, then it's tax free. Once you pull it out to spend it on something else, or store it in a low-risk investment (CD, savings, gold, etc) then you pay your normal tax rate on it.

I wouldn't have a problem with a sales tax except that 1) it makes running a business more complex (sending taxes to state and fed, tracking two different tax rates), 2) our economy runs on consumerism, which would suffer a blow, and 3) as others have pointed out it unfairly taxes the poor - even prebates wouldn't be sufficient. Note that today there are many people who could and should be on food stamps and other assistance programs but can't or won't go to the effort (which turns out to be non-trivial) of doing the paperwork for them. The consumerism angle is interesting - right now people are ok with a 20-30% income tax, but the instant they find that their candy bars and cars cost 20-30% more for a federal sales tax, they're going to stop spending.

Further, it doesn't solve the problem of investment income. The rich would again see very, very low taxes, while the poor would be taxed on every cent because they have to use 100% of their income on purchases, which would be heavily taxed, while the rich only have to spend 1-5% of their income on purchases.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Somehow I don't think this will help take Perry's campaign out of its tailspin. You guys got lucky - take it from a Texan, a Perry presidency would be a nightmare. If only we had some way of getting him out of the governor's office, too, without having to vote for the only thing worse: a Texas Democrat.
 
C

Chibibar

GasBandit said:
Somehow I don't think this will help take Perry's campaign out of its tailspin. You guys got lucky - take it from a Texan, a Perry presidency would be a nightmare. If only we had some way of getting him out of the governor's office, too, without having to vote for the only thing worse: a Texas Democrat.
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I still don't support the guy but was interesting that he propose it, but I got confuse with the whole weird convoulted proposal.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Chibibar said:
I still don't support the guy but was interesting that he propose it, but I got confuse with the whole weird convoulted proposal.
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If you ask me, the problem is the flat tax is still a tax on production. Replacing it with a consumption tax makes more sense to me.

But that's just another one of my wacky pipe dreams.

On another note... I wonder why capital gains tax is flat? Surely if the problem is the warren buffets of the world only paying 15% taxes because their income is really just capital gains... wouldn't it make sense to make a progressive slope to capital gains taxes? Hypothetically of course.
 
AshburnerX

AshburnerX

Aren't Texas Democrats like Unicorns? You know... a fabled beast the exists in legend, but has never seen the light of day? Also, there are tons of fakes, but they are just Texas Republicans with horns glued on their head?
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
AshburnerX said:
Aren't Texas Democrats like Unicorns? You know... a fabled beast the exists in legend, but has never seen the light of day? Also, there are tons of fakes, but they are just Texas Republicans with horns glued on their head?
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They are real, and they look like this.

 
Krisken

Krisken

GasBandit said:
If you ask me, the problem is the flat tax is still a tax on production. Replacing it with a consumption tax makes more sense to me.

But that's just another one of my wacky pipe dreams.
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And we're back to killing the poor, who spend 100% of their income just to stay alive and the rich hoarding and not spending again.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Krisken said:
And we're back to killing the poor, who spend 100% of their income just to stay alive and the rich hoarding and not spending again.
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Prebate. And I can show you way more "rich" people who spend with no taxable income than you can show me ones with income that don't spend anything.
 
Krisken

Krisken

1. The prebate is supposedly going to help eliminate the IRS, or rather the need for so many employees at the IRS. This is a crock. Who makes sure people are claiming the proper number of people in a household?

2. It prebates the amount of tax a family will pay on certain spending allowances determined by the government, and is set nation wide. Isn't this what we're trying to avoid? More complications?

3. How long before one group of people complain that the prebate is set too high and another that the prebate is set too low? Shit, we can't even get our congress to tax millionaires properly.

4. People who complain already about Social Security, a check being cut from the government, would be all over this. How can a group of people who believe that Social Security should be done away with turn around and advocate for a program which does the same thing?

These are just a couple problems I have with it. There are more, believe me. The only reason to advocate a prebate is to remove it at a later date.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
1) Don't we already have most of that data from the census?

2) Again, don't we already have that information? How does this complicate, rather than simplify?

3) How can there be an argument when the math is shown?

4) The issue with social security isn't the government cutting a check, the issue with social security is that it is a ponzi scheme, where payouts come only so long as more people are paying in than drawing out, which is becoming less and less the case.
 
C

Chibibar

I see. You do have many points.

In an ideal perfect world everyone should have access to basic home/apartment and basic food. If you work, then you can have access to better home, stuff, food etc etc. Yea that is socialistic type society that will never work in the real world.

Right now, there are so many taxes and loopholes that average person can't understand, but I do see that we are paying a lot in taxes
Paycheck = initial tax and services like Medicare, SS
Owning a home = yearly property tax. Paid with the money you get with paycheck
buying anything = sales tax of various degree, Hotel tax, airplane/security tax, sin tax and what not.

Sadly, being a homeowner I get tax 3 times with my measly check :( (property tax, buying food, and initial paycheck taxes)
and I hope that I file my taxes correctly or have income tax. Some states (not Texas) have state income tax.

That is just the basic and not including all the other taxes people don't know about.

I personally wouldn't mind paying a single tax like sales tax. Sales tax already have to be divided with different group. It exist in the system like in Dallas there is Dart Tax (1%) local sales tax and state sales tax. Just add federal level and get rid of all other taxes. (like no more property tax, income tax)

I buy something (which will happen) I pay a sales tax. Now of course from my understanding it would be like 20-25% I think that is better than trying to find loopholes like the rich to avoid all kinds of taxes like 1$ yearly income or investment/off shore accounts.

When a person spend 1000$ a night a room, BAM there is the tax (sales tax)
buying a cup of coffee

now of course this means that no one get tax exemption either so all entities have to pay sales tax.

I haven't figure out on Corporation or education sale tax exemption yet.
Added at: 16:36
Krisken said:
Again, done. Any moron that calls Social Security a ponzi scheme should have his head examined.
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Isn't the bases of a Ponzi scheme is that the current "members/payment" pays toward the previous generation?

Now from what I heard the issue is not the "ponzi" but the law that allow government to dip/access SS money for other projects which now has become a "ponzi like schemes" The baby boomers put a ton of money into it, but most of those money were paid to the previous generation (which is not as big) but the government dip into it (from what I understand) and now our generation (gen X and Y) are trying to help cover the Baby boomer generations cause the money is gonna run out.
 
Krisken

Krisken

Chibibar said:
Now from what I heard the issue is not the "ponzi" but the law that allow government to dip/access SS money for other projects which now has become a "ponzi like schemes" The baby boomers put a ton of money into it, but most of those money were paid to the previous generation (which is not as big) but the government dip into it (from what I understand) and now our generation (gen X and Y) are trying to help cover the Baby boomer generations cause the money is gonna run out.
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That I have a problem with as well. That fund should never have been touched by the government.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Well, yes, if the money was kept in a separate "social security, YOU CANNOT SPEND THIS ON OTHER THINGS" fund, then it would... stop being a ponzi scheme.
 
Norris

Norris

GasBandit said:
Well, yes, if the money was kept in a separate "social security, YOU CANNOT SPEND THIS ON OTHER THINGS" fund, then it would... stop being a ponzi scheme.
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So amputate the toe rather than get the ingrown nail taken care of is what you're saying, basically?

"The problem with my toe is that the nail is ingrown! Clearly, it need to be removed."
"Why not just, y'know, get the nail fixed."
"Then it would cease to be an ingrown nail and I'd have no excuse to amputate it. Fuck that toe."
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
People putting words in my mouth again. Krisken said "people" who want to eliminate social security. I've never argued for *eliminating* it, I have argued for privatizing it. Once again you guys are straw-manning me.
 
C

Chibibar

GasBandit said:
People putting words in my mouth again. Krisken said "people" who want to eliminate social security. I've never argued for *eliminating* it, I have argued for privatizing it. Once again you guys are straw-manning me.
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I think to some "privatize" would pretty much kill it ;)

It was all good until the government can dip into it and invest to stuff they shouldn't be doing and lose a ton of money (again I read this somewhere but too lazy to reference it all) I mean if you think about it, where did all the money the Baby boomers (the largest population in terms of SS income earners) gone to? the previous generation is not as big that is why they are calling "baby boomers" ;)
 
Necronic

Necronic

Staff member
GasBandit said:
1) Don't we already have most of that data from the census?
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The census is not an adequate way to do tax information. It is unreliable on the individual level and is only done once every 4 years or so. Moreover, while people may (for the most part) be telling the truth right now, if you were to do this it would incentivize cheating which would screw up both the tax info, as well as the basic census info that is needed.

It would be like trying to build a car with a Chilton's manual.

Edit: Also Perry's flat tax proposal is ridiculous (in terms of income tax at least.) How much money would an individual have to earn, with the current marginal tax brackets, before a flat tax was justifiable?

I don't know the number for sure, but based on my own income and some really rough (as in I am just guessing) extrapolation, the 20% flat tax would only be preferable when you are in the 100K+ income range. Meaning that all it really accomplishes is a complication of the tax code (since you can still do it the traditional way) and a tax cut for the rich.

Someone should have spent less time on the farm and more time studying his numbers. I'm referring to Perry here......not Gas......
 
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