Bush: "Let's Screw The Poor. I Mean, More."

[bobquasit]

I'd heard rumors, but I can't believe that even Bush would be so open about "considering" replacing the federal income tax with a national sales tax.

Of course this would be incredibly regressive; it would make life for the poor and middle class in America even more difficult, and in some cases probably impossible.

That bastard has no shame or conscience at all, and he really thinks (or does he know?) that the public and the media won't ever catch on, no matter how much he and his gang of criminals screw everyone.

Comments

[klyfix.livejournal.com]

The appeal, apparently, is in the notion of "simplification"; the idea that
people hate to fill out tax forms so they'd be game for a flat income tax
or a sales tax where they don't need all the tables and stuff. And of course
there are those goofy sorts who consider the income tax to be unconstitutional,
as a violation of the Fifth Amendment or whatever. Of course those folk tend
to be libertarians who don't really believe in taxes.

But that all is the Sales Pitch. The Reality is that such a switch would
be the ultimate culmination of the shift of the tax burden from the rich
and corporations to middle claass and poor working people. That's the purpose.

[tprjones.livejournal.com]

The idea that a sales tax must be regressive is a myth. Most states (as well as the proposed national sales tax) exempt basic food items from sales tax (basic as-in nearly anything that contains more than one serving). The proposals I've seen for a national sales tax also exempt basic clothing (as defined by price-per-article-of-clothing cutoff points), housing, and utilities.

So, someone that is too poor to buy TVs and VCRs and junk food and expensive clothes and computer components and all that stuff will be paying $0 in taxes. How does that hurt the poor? It doesn't!

Yachts, expensive cars, mansions, all the large-ticket items that the rich purchase would all have a nice fat tax attached to it. Instead of being able to weasel out of paying their income taxes with tax shelters and whatnot, they end up paying taxes on everything they purchase with no recourse to finding loopholes. How does this help the rich? It doesn't!

Sure, most middle-class American families that are busily spending up their credit card debt on consumer goods they don't need would pay more taxes for it. However, they can also choose to live a more modest life - live within their income for a change - and pay much less tax because of it. Unlike with the income tax, they have a CHOICE about how much tax they pay, based on how they decide to live their life.

America is about freedom, right? Isn't freedom all about having choices?

I really don't understand the problem here.

[klyfix.livejournal.com]

Was going to argue, decided pointless,
mostly, eh, why not.
High ticket items _already_ have extra taxes on them. A tax only on "luxuries"
to entirely make up for the income tax would be absurdly high. And as the
general trend has been to move the tax burden from the wealthy and corporations
to the middle and working class, I can't see that those with influence
would allow a tax that would really only affect the rich, leaving the rest
of us to be "lucky duckies."

Basically, a properly done income tax is the "fairest" in that, yes, it
takes most from those who have benefited most. "Taxes are the price we pay
for civlization" (that's supposedly from Oliver Wendall Holmes). The present tax
system needs fixing, but replacing it with a system that will not in fact
charge the wealthiest more and will at the very least make it harder for
the rest of us to afford little luxuries is _not_ a social good by any
stretch.

(Let me immediatly concede defeat in the argument, by the way. I know darned good and well
that I'm not going to change anybody's mind with this, I totally suck at debate.)

[tprjones.livejournal.com]

Of course, it's sadly a moot point. The Republicans would never let it go through without all sorts of loopholes for yacths and high-end automobiles and the like, and the Democrats would never let it go through because of this myth that it's automatically regressive and evil (and also because W is propossing it, which also makes it automatically evil ... I actually suspect that it's possible he and his cronies are bringing it up specifically to kill it with the Democrats, because they don't want a good sales tax since it removes all the loopholes that the rich use to avoid paying income taxes).

*sigh*

I can dream, though, can't I?

[klyfix.livejournal.com]

To follow up...
According to http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2004_08/004499.php
(well, according to something linked to from that blog) somebody in the
administration says Bush isn't considering a sales tax.

There's also a link there to an examination of the idea that says the necessary
rate for a sales tax that replaces the income tax would be 26%. That's a lot.
And that is assuming no cheating and that the tax is also on food and housing.
Figuring in cheating makes it higher. And if you replace all federal taxes
with a sales tax the rate goes as high as (and this is impressive) 60%.

Presumably folk in government know this already, and that's why it's just
rhetoric and not something that would ever actually happen.