Flat Tax and Tithing

[The Thriller]

Since this IRS thing a lot of my conservative friends have been crying for tax reform. They are using the argument that 10 percent is good enough for The Lord so why isn't it good enough for the government? I just think that's an interesting comparison and argument.

 

[Zulu]

WUt????

 

[unluckyseventeen]

https://qkme.me/3up0z0

 

[Nate505]

“And once again tithing is 10% off the top. That’s gross income, not net. Please people, don’t force us to audit. Now I’m going to pass this around a second time. Brother Ned, you’ll do the honors.”

 

[Gameface]

The tax rate and the level of government services need to be connected to one another. While I'm a libertarian, that's an ideological position. In the real world there are services being provided and they need to be paid for. If we'd like to stop providing those services we need to make that decision first, not take the conservative approach of shutting off the funds and watching the program flounder about before it suffocates.

It's like if you have a dog you can't take care of. Shutting it in the closet until it "goes away" is not an honorable way to go about your dilemma. But that seems to be the approach conservatives are taking in regard to our fiscal situation. They've made their "no new taxes" pledge and their sticking to it no matter the consequences.

 

[Dr. Jones]

The tax rate and the level of government services need to be connected to one another. While I'm a libertarian, that's an ideological position. In the real world there are services being provided and they need to be paid for. If we'd like to stop providing those services we need to make that decision first, not take the conservative approach of shutting off the funds and watching the program flounder about before it suffocates.

It's like if you have a dog you can't take care of. Shutting it in the closet until it "goes away" is not an honorable way to go about your dilemma. But that seems to be the approach conservatives are taking in regard to our fiscal situation. They've made their "no new taxes" pledge and their sticking to it no matter the consequences.

Speaking for myself, that is a gross mischaracterization. Said slightly differently;

If no one can seem to shut some programs down because the money is there.. let's remove the money and force solutions. (I'm not debating this topic here, though..)

 

[PearlWatson]

That's what you call equality under the law. We can't have that.

 

[One Brow]

That's what you call equality under the law. We can't have that.

$1000 means a lot more to a person living on $10000/year than $10000 means to someone living on $100000/year. It's not equality.

 

[babe]

$1000 means a lot more to a person living on $10000/year than $10000 means to someone living on $100000/year. It's not equality.

What anything "means" or is supposed to "mean" is irrelevant on an objective scale of measurement. You float in and out of objectivity to suit your purposes with so little good reason it actually is insane.

 

[Dr. Jones]

$1000 means a lot more to a person living on $10000/year than $10000 means to someone living on $100000/year. It's not equality.

Puke. Vomit. Puke.

 

[leftyjace]

$1000 means a lot more to a person living on $10000/year than $10000 means to someone living on $100000/year. It's not equality.

And if you have 2 people living in a house each making $10,000 a year, what about $2,000 a year versus $20,000 a year? More palatable, right?

That's the problem with making exceptions. Let's say there's a flat tax of 10%, and a guy is making $100,000. Due to the graduated flat tax, if an individual is making less than, oh, say, $60,000, they only pay 8% versus 10%. So what does the guy do? He apportions half of the income - or possibly, 40% - to his spouse. They both pay at the 8% rate instead of the 10% rate, and voila, they've ducked $2,000 in taxes simply by creative accounting.

For those that espouse exceptions to promote fairness, you must acknowledge that those exceptions are also opportunities for others to exploit, and end up being even less fair in the long run.

 

[One Brow]

What anything "means" or is supposed to "mean" is irrelevant on an objective scale of measurement. You float in and out of objectivity to suit your purposes with so little good reason it actually is insane.

By any objective measure of which I know. taxing $1,000 from a family making $10,000 causes a more significant loss than $10,000 from a family making $100,000. Of course, these are measures that value things like fresh vegetables and medicine as being more important than a third car.

 

[One Brow]

And if you have 2 people living in a house each making $10,000 a year, what about $2,000 a year versus $20,000 a year? More palatable, right?

That's the problem with making exceptions. Let's say there's a flat tax of 10%, and a guy is making $100,000. Due to the graduated flat tax, if an individual is making less than, oh, say, $60,000, they only pay 8% versus 10%. So what does the guy do? He apportions half of the income - or possibly, 40% - to his spouse. They both pay at the 8% rate instead of the 10% rate, and voila, they've ducked $2,000 in taxes simply by creative accounting.

For those that espouse exceptions to promote fairness, you must acknowledge that those exceptions are also opportunities for others to exploit, and end up being even less fair in the long run.

By contrast, if you simply exempt the first, say $20,000 of income person, than no "juking" occurs at all, and the couple pays the same amount of taxes regardless of who makes the income. However, no matter how you structure the code, however simple you try to make it, the wealthy will find a way to juke it, via either their accountants or their political influence.

Is our current tax code designed to benefit the rich in many ways to which middle-class taxpayers have no access? I would say yes. Is the answer to make the system more unfair? I answer no.

 

[HipHopAnonymous]

"I was working on a flat tax proposal and I accidentally proved there's no god."

 

[HipHopAnonymous]

If you just change the tax laws to a flat 10% or so, this doesn't make the 50% of people who pay NO income tax just automatically start paying their share. That's your bigger problem.

 

[babe]

By any objective measure of which I know. taxing $1,000 from a family making $10,000 causes a more significant loss than $10,000 from a family making $100,000. Of course, these are measures that value things like fresh vegetables and medicine as being more important than a third car.

so if you really want to be objective, come down from the ivy-covered tower and go out on the street for a day.

There is a reason why someone with a particular expertise. . .. say jumping higher than a six-foot-eight defender can reach and dunking a basketball. . . . can be paid ten times as much as the flat-footed Al. It's because somehow that "means" something to the man who's offering the job. In fact, it doesn't matter if the job gets done, if for any reason the man with the money is willing to pay for it. Some dude with a car dealership sees this as the objective reality all the time. People willing to pay a lot for what they want with their own money. Whether it's worth it or not.

Political hacks of every stripe are willing to do the same thing, but with other people's money.

While you are right that some folks live marginal lives of mere survival while others have more than is required for sustaining life on the same criteria, you have bought into a philosophy that your ideas of value are superior to those of other people, and you are claiming that your judgment is better than others, and concluding that you have the moral authority to take their money and do what you want with it.

In the real world, a copper penny is only a copper penny, a piece of printed fiat currency is only that, and a cup of coffee is just a cup of coffee. What's it's worth to anyone is their business, not yours. Or the government's.

 

[babe]

By contrast, if you simply exempt the first, say $20,000 of income person, than no "juking" occurs at all, and the couple pays the same amount of taxes regardless of who makes the income. However, no matter how you structure the code, however simple you try to make it, the wealthy will find a way to juke it, via either their accountants or their political influence.

Is our current tax code designed to benefit the rich in many ways to which middle-class taxpayers have no access? I would say yes. Is the answer to make the system more unfair? I answer no.

I can hardly imagine anything that could be be more unfair than this.

Some folks justly view our present tax code and the system we have in place to administer it as perhaps one of the greatest RICO operations on Earth. Too many lobbyists, too many politicians, and too many bureaucrats, and everybody working for their own personal benefit.

The IRS agent who can't run ten-key with no sense of humor for the taxpayer who laughs at that incompetence has the power to just destroy the citizen with the courage to laugh. Seize the cash in the till, close the shop, and sell it at auction. Many federal departments of government have their own "courts" and their own "judges", and you don't get to contest the rules they make. No jury, no right to appeal their decisions, and no vote to change the officials.

Anyone who really means to be "fair" has got to start with taking down this whole system.

 

[Dr. Jones]

I'd like to address poverty at the community, rather than national, level.

I am not a typical right-winger.. I care about those that are suffering. I also have a great disdain for the idea that we should all be equal. I believe in equal opportunity.. but not equalling out the results of individual efforts.

 

[leftyjace]

By contrast, if you simply exempt the first, say $20,000 of income person, than no "juking" occurs at all, and the couple pays the same amount of taxes regardless of who makes the income. However, no matter how you structure the code, however simple you try to make it, the wealthy will find a way to juke it, via either their accountants or their political influence.

Is our current tax code designed to benefit the rich in many ways to which middle-class taxpayers have no access? I would say yes. Is the answer to make the system more unfair? I answer no.

Did you mean $20,00 of income PER person in the household?
Isn't that unfair against single individuals that live alone because they're fat and smelly?
The thought is ridiculous, of course, but what about people that wish to take advantage of benefits like that, so they enter in domestic partnerships so they can legally be considered to be of the same household... even if they're not romantically involved, just roommates?

All I'm saying is that there will always be a method (palatable or not) to work the system if the system isn't uniform.

 

[Dr. Jones]

I'd like to address poverty at the community, rather than national, level.

I am not a typical right-winger.. I care about those that are suffering. I also have a great disdain for the idea that we should all be equal. I believe in equal opportunity.. but not equalling out the results of individual efforts.

I said that very poorly. I didn't mean to imply most conservatives aren't sympathetic to those in tough economic conditions.. I just meant to say that I may lean more left in that regard than most.