Why don't we just have a 15% income tax across the land with no exemptions?

Question

SORRY - To all those who are so privilaged, they live off the fat of the land. Think of it as bad for the heart.

This way the people who make less, would pay less.
The people who make more would pay more.
This is NOT how the system currently works.
The hell with taxes for the little people, everyone should pay their share.

Answer 1

Hi Linda Ann. We all know about the oppressive nature of the income tax system and we all resent Uncle Sam sticking his hand into our pockets. There are two bills in congress-H-25 and S-25, these are the Fair Tax bills. When passed, they would eliminate the federal income tax and replace it with a national sales tax on NEW items. Please go to fairtax.org and read about it. The simple fact is that there is no "flat tax" bill in congress, but the fair tax is far more equitable. Virtually every county in the country has a fair tax group and fairtax.org will help you find one close. We need all the support we can find to get this passed. Ken

Answer 2

Well, 15% wouldn't provide nearly as much money as the current tax system. It would have to be a lot more than that to continue current government services.

Our current system is progressive, which means that people with lower incomes pay little or nothing (or with EIC, actually get back some money they didn't pay in), and as your income rises, so does your tax rate. Your question implies that you think the flat 15% rate would hit the wealthy hardest - you've got that backwards. Over 96% of federal income taxes are paid by the top 50% or earners, about 2/3 is paid by the top 10%, and well over half of the income tax collected is paid by the top 5% of earners. Your proposal would give these people a huge break, and hit the middle class and the poor hard - is that really what you are proposing?

Are there abuses? Sure. Not just at the top with abusive tax shelters - but an awful lot much lower down with people working "under the table" - that wouldn't be touched with a flat tax rate.

Is the current system too complex? Well, that's hard to argue against - it definitely is.

Answer 3

This is a great question, but I don't suspect we'll ever agree on an answer. Some feel that a flat tax would cause an ever increasing gap between the poor and the rich... that it would cause even greater suffering for those who struggle just to live.

On the other hand, some feel that a scaled tax system penalizes the better earners for their hard work. Further, many believe that there are too many exemptions to get the rich off the hook for supporting the needs of the government which provides them with the services they need.

Personally, I would favor scrapping the income tax system altogether in favor of a scaled sales tax system, where mandatory items (e.g. food, clothes, transportation) gets taxed the least, discretionary items (e.g. entertainment, travel) gets taxed more, and luxury items (e.g. high-cost, low-volume goods, such as sports cars, high-end jewelry, lavish houses) are taxed the most.

This would make sure that we pay taxes proportionally to our ability to pay taxes, and would not let anybody off the hook through offshoring business, or executing illegal, underground transactions that never appear on income tax forms anyway.

Answer 4

Mainly because it would really put the burden on the middle and lower classes (ie the hard working people). The rich and upper class wouldn't be paying their share of the taxes. Look at it this way for someone making 12,000 a year their tax would be 2300 $ which means they'd only have 9700$ to live on. While a person making 100,000$ would pay only 15,000$ and the gap between rich and poor would widen as big as the grand canyon. The person making the little amount above would have to work 2 jobs just to possibly make ends meet (that is if they have no children).

Answer 5

I don't know, I'm a Republican.
It would be tough to get it for it needs a super-majority.(75%for)

The Case Against the Flat Tax by Murray Rothbard .....
http://www.mises.org/rothbard/flattax.pdf

To return now to the flat tax: the seductive rhetoric invoking the “special interests” has lead most people to believe that everyone will benefit from the flat tax except a few wicked corporations or multi-millionaires.
Nothing could be further from the truth. If the flat tax is enacted, millions of us will find out, too late and to our chagrin, that, to paraphrase Pogo:
“We have met the special interests and they are us.” Or as Senator Robert Dole (R-KS) put it recently on the issue of the flat tax as an allegedly fair tax:
“Everybody believes in fairness unless they’re involved.”

Answer 6

Because the current tax system in the US allows congress to tinker with it, so that they can help friends, penalize enemies, steer money back to their constituents, and do a bit of social engineering. For example, if congress wants to encourage more home ownership, they can make more of a home-owner's mortgage payments deductable. If they want to discourage owning big gas guzzling cars, they can add a luxury tax to cars weighing more than 5,000 lbs or getting under 20 mpg.

Answer 7

Privileged people who live of the fat of the land would love that idea!!! The idea is called a flat tax, Steve Forbes ran for president advocating it and lost.

Also, the majority of CPAs work comes from performing financial audits and to think that CPAs and tax attorney as a whole have enough clout to keep a complex tax system in place is stupid.

Answer 8

I agree with you!
We should have NO deductions and everyone should pay their own taxes, not combined spousal income.
No exemptions for clergy...they work!
AND here's the kicker in my perfect little world....those on disability should pay 15% too, because that is their JOB!

The only income I wouldn't tax is Social Security RETIREMENT benifits, because you would have already paid on that, and intrest on traditional savings accounts, as insentive for savings.

Unfortunatly our country is run buy the corporations who feed us poison and deny us health care so we are just screwed.

Answer 9

I wish we did too! But...it would put a lot of people out of business. Mainly CPA's that do taxes.

Answer 10

Great question. All the accountants and tax lawyers would probably kill themselves.