Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Fair Tax...

Pete...read the book...the Fair Tax or H.R. 25 is the "other" proposal...the national sales tax with no more patroll deductions of federal income tax FICA etc. you will take home what you earn or net what you now gross...

I have a degree in economics from a big name college & I can tell you no one knows what will happen with this massive of a change in our economy. Looj at the law of unintended consequences in Middle east.

I also personally know John Linder and wonder about his ability to think up something this big. If congress wanted to they could simplify our current system & make it fair, so why would anyone trust them to give up the main source of their power & ability to steal.

Tom, from what I've learned so far Rep. Linder has just picked this ball up as this concept has been around awhile.As far as congress "wanting" to simplify or make fair a tax system it is OUR responsibility as voters to convince congress that this is the thing to do...
Change is hard...status quo is easy...real change will require effort on a larger part of the people.
I'm no economist Tom but I can count and I believe a change such as HR 25 would greatly benefit me and I'm average so to speak so there are ALOT of folks it would help...I realize there will be unknowns but there always are but will it help you personaly taken at face value...curious here...

The best tax is no tax at all. It is quite feasisble in an economy as large and diverse as ours. The reason it will never happen is that taxation is about more, much mre, than merely financing public services. Taxation is the means through which statists subtly control public behavior. They don't necessarily need to prohibit a behavior, they can simply tax it to death.

I don't have an opinion on whether the proposed Fair Tax is a good idea or not in the US, however in Canada, we pay lots of taxes, first federal a percentage of net income that rises to 29% at $123k in annual income. Most provinces tack their taxes as a percentage of the federal amount except Alberta which has a flat 10% tax on net income. This was brought in under a fairness iniative and for me it's realy fair, but for people who make under $65k/yr they actually pay more tax here than in other jurisdictions.

All taxes are unfair, there is no way to make them the same for all income earners except to tax consumption. Spend more, pay more tax.

The problem with the Fair Tax:

The plan is almost universally opposed by those who get their information and form beliefs from 30 second sound bites, or allow pundits to tell them what to think. I've met many such. Having said that however, I have NEVER met a person who took the time to read and digest the whole book and yet remained in favor of the current system.


It will be a tough job getting the Fair Tax to pass, because most folks are either too stupid, too lazy, or too busy to read the book. They form an opinion and cast a vote (or fail to vote) based on erronious information. This is usually followed by a lament about the sheep that are being led around by political gonifs.

A Democratic Republic such as concieved by the founding fathers can be successful only when there is an educated, rational, and informed electorate casting the votes.

All the more reason to keep the topic alive...

Which is why the American left wing is so fixated on controlling public schools and eradicating home schooling. Gotta keep the proles ignorant, otherwise the unwashed masses will start asking questions like "Where do my tax dollars actually go?"

I believe the "Fair Tax" is a form of national sales tax, except with the additional feature that everybody gets a check for a constant small amount every year from the government: that piece serves to further "progressivize" the tax so that poor people don't pay any net tax and really poor people get subsidized.

On the plus side, it removes one of the biggest privacy (and therefore liberty) sinks in modern American society: you no longer have to tell the government how much money you make. That's a Very Big Deal in its implications as far as social engineering is concerned, although it may not immediately sound like much.

On the minus side, it is absolutely not "fair," by any stretch of the word or the imagination, for two reasons.

First, it's a tax. All taxation is theft, and theft can never be fair. Conditioning people who don't know any better to call it fair, to my way of thinking, is pernicious.

Second, it costs rich people more than it costs poor people. The only truly fair way to finance government is for each person to pay specifically for the government "services" he receives, and not for the ones anyone else receives. That's fair. But poor people tend to use a lot of government "services," while rich people typically use very few.

And of course there's the fact somebody else brought up that unless held almost literally at gunpoint, the government is never, ever, ever going to give up the amount of power the "Fair Tax" would cost it, and therefore folks like Fred Thompson can smile for the cameras and say that of course they support the "Fair Tax," without any danger of ever actually being called to pay the piper.

Is it better than what we have now?

Well, there is that one big benefit about increased privacy, and that, taken together with its implications, is a very big benefit indeed. I don't see any other benefits at the moment, though, and there's the fact somebody mentioned that it's pretty much impossible to foresee the unintended economic consequences. Additionally, if it doesn't matter whether or not Fred Thompson supports the "Fair Tax," it certainly doesn't matter whether I support it either. It's kind of like the question of reparations for slavery: good for riling people up, but not plausible enough to go much further.

So, all things considered, I guess I'm almost neutral on the "Fair Tax," leaning slightly toward positive.

The question is, just who would not benefit?? The gov't will never give up "X" number of dollars.. So just where would the money come from? And how!! No one knows.. It's virgin territory. While it may be the answer, it's going to take some SERIOUS research to uncover those unknowns AND get the populace to buy this idea.. Might as well scale Everest with no ropes while clad in a swimsuit..

Not true by any stretch. Business and the middle class and higher incomes use tax money at a far higher rate than the poor--it just comes in much less direct methods. "Welfare" as we call it, takes up a small amount of Federal and state budgets. More money is spent on indirect welfare to business and those individuals who are not poor.

The poor participate in voting at a significantly lower rate than other segments of our populace--the politicians know this, and they spend far more money on other government programs that will get them elected.





Very true, and this is the crux of the matter--no entity willingly gives up power.




Yes.






Me too.


Casey

The big question for me is :

Would agreeing with you and Barak make folks around the 'fire think I'm smart , too ?

As it was explained to me...which maybe as bass ackwards as something can get. no more IRS...everything would be collected from sales tax only. If you dont want to pay taxes..dont buy anything.

So if you're a prostitute or a farmer..if you buy it, you get taxed on it.

sounds like an idea to me.....

Since the Fair Tax would strip power from the Feds, it will never have a chance of implementation. I see zero chance that the 16th Amendment can be rolled back.
Excellent idea, and God knows we need change. The Fair Tax, like Ron Paul, has no chance.
I have the book, and have read it several times.

We have a BIG spending problem which congress won't address, I'd rather focus on spending rather than on a radical change to the taxing system.

I do not know if this system would benefit me because I make a lot of money but do not know what effect this "Fair Tax" would have on the valuation of my assets.To me this is a solution in search of a problem.

There are no downsides, but lots of upsides to this proposal. I've been an advocate for years. The only losers are those in power who want to continue forcing Americans to report on themselves to Federal agents each year. Information is power. To require, under threat of arrest, each citizen to make a report to a Federal agent each year about their private affairs, keeps the citizen "in his place." People invested in doing that, will not like this tax, but everyone else should like it very much.

"Fair tax" kinda sounds like "humane execution" to me: it's all based on perceptions and standing.

Our system of taxation is most certainly broke and in need of repair, but it is just one of many symptoms of the overriding disease: corrupt government. The gov certainly does not believe it is broke. Indeed, they are stealing from the moronic populus more and more successfully than ever before. They have become the master and all others are the peons. As professionals and others become more closely associated with the governing bodies, their surfdom diminishes and a master status ensues for them as well. Until the people become united around common problems and solutions, it will never change, but the stifling politics of polarization will make sure that never happens.

If the current status quo of "representation" remains intact, does anyone really have any belief that any change in taxation, or any other issue, would not quickly devolve into a larcenous mess that was as bad or worse than what it replaced?