I personally do not consider paying taxes a penalty. However, I do think that tiered taxes penalize those who make more money. There is a subtle, but important, difference there.
I will not preach that what I suggest is the best and only solution. I see a national sales tax as a way to generate tax revenues from sources that previously did not pay tax....illegal activity. Think of all the money that changes hands 'under the table' that is not taxed. These people still need to buy stuff. So a sales tax would allow us to collect some tax revenue from what I imagine would be billions of dollars changing hands each year. I envision the tax working the same way sales tax does in a lot of states, which pretty much handles your concerns about non-profits, charities, businesses, government spending and investments. Just thinking off the top of my head, I would say that anything physical you can buy...from real estate to a box of thumb tacks would be taxable except food and medicine. I will admit that there are some other things that would need to be worked out. But, I think it could work and I think it does not have to be as complicated as most might make it out to be. On Wed, Mar 4, 2009 at 11:10 PM, Gruss Gott <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Stroz wrote: > > but without getting penalized for being rich and having a higher tax > > rate. > > > > There's really only 2 core options when it comes to paying for your > country (I'll describe them in the language of your people, the > demagogues): > > (1.) Penalize earners. This is called the income tax. > (2.) Penalize spenders. This is called the sales tax. > > Now that we've gotten the bullshit out of the way ...explain how this > sales tax would work in a bit more detail. > > E.g., What about businesses? would their spending be taxed? If not > what's to stop rampant fraud? (e.g., the SUV craze) If so aren't you > penalizing business? How about government spending? How about > non-profits and charities? > > How would taxes be affected during huge downturns in spending such as > now? (vs. income of course) > > What about fiscal policy that's engineering through the tax code? > What's needed and what's not? What impact would the changes have? > What would we lose and/or what would change? > > How about imports? What about resellers? > > What about buying stocks, bonds, securities, et al? Is that > considered spending? If you tax it aren't you penalizing investment? > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:290569 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
