Do you support the Fair Tax that Neal Boortz and John Linder are putting forward?

Answer 1

Most definitely. Although I am opposed to any income tax whatsoever (it was supposed to be abolished years ago, but what do you know, the government decided to keep it up) I think that the Fair Tax is about the only way to go. Think about it. Rich people buy more expensive things, so they pay more taxes by default, and poorer people spend less money so they pay less taxes. Food could be exempt. And with purchases being the driving force behind tax collection, even your drug dealers and illegal aliens would be paying taxes! In reference to that guy above who says "it taxes the poor at the same rate as the rich" he obviously doesn't get percentages. If he has a dollar and the tax is 10% he pays ten cents. If I have 100 dollars and I pay 10% I cover ten dollars. That is 100 times what he paid. What was being purchased is irrelevant, unless you want to make the argument that poor people should pay zero taxes. And I don't dig Socialism. (By the way, I work in the Grocery industry and these "poor" people who come in with food stamps (80% of our business) buy their essential items on their food stamps, then buy 3 times as much in chips, coke, cotton candy, and all sorts of garbage. If they didn't buy that junk they could afford food.)

Answer 2

I would really need to read their proposal. Past fair tax proposals for a national sales tax to me would punish the poor much more than the current system ( I doubt if that return payment up to the poverty line would get to you very quick). What would be done with all the state and local sales taxes since in many cases that is a major part of their funding sources (Would we in some places have a sales tax of 40%?) I agree the current system is a mess (I have worked at IRS and just the management and personnel there is reason enough to want to get rid of the whole system) but we have to make sure what replaces it is better. Also government expenses do go up what would we do then allow this sales tax to go up to a ridiculous level? Also we have to remember that there are state, local and special district income taxes and how the change in the federal system would impact these taxes.

Answer 3

Good Lord no! There's NOTHING fair about it!

The so-called "Fair Tax" is a major break for the wealthy, that's for sure. Contrary to what some uninformed souls think, the wealthy got that way by RETAINING their earnings, NOT by spending it! They'd pay much less total tax under the "Fair Tax" than they do now.

Problem is, if you remove the tax burden from one group you have to move it to another to maintain revenues. That means that the poor and middle class would have to pick up the slack. The working poor would be decimated by the "Fair Tax" and the middle class would buckle at the knees.

Consider a single mother with 2 kids making about $16,500 a year. She pays no Federal income tax and with the EIC probably has about $19,000 in cash flow to work with. She and her kids survive, but only just. With the "Fair Tax" (or the equally heinous "Flat Tax" her cash flow would plummet to around $13,000. The "prebate" feature might bring her back to around $16,000 if she's lucky but she'll still be thousands worse off under the "Fair Tax" than she is now.

The "prebate" feature will make EIC fraud look like small change. The IRS (they'll still administer taxes) will have to spend billions to upgrade their computer infrastructure to track the "prebate" in real time to try and fight fraud.

With a 25% tax on top of state taxes that are nudging 10% in some areas, black marketing activity will sky rocket as people -- especially the poor -- try to avoid the tax. Look at the back-alley deals on booze and tobacco in NYC due to the absurdly high taxes on those items there!

In an effort to curb tax evasion and rampant black marketing it's likely that the IRS will start to audit taxpayers in their homes and demand proof that everything in the home is properly tax paid. If you think IRS audits are invasive today, see what THAT will bring!

The "Fair Tax" and "Flat Tax" are touted by the wealthy for good reason -- they'll save a BUNDLE. The poor and middle class will be CREAMED by either. For that reason alone, there is zero chance that either tax would ever be implemented in the US. Thank God!

Answer 4

No. It's not fair.

Among other things, it taxes the poor at the same front-end percentage (or, in other words, as much as) the rich, taking away money that the poor NEED to spend on things like food and shelter. Think about it this way:

Let's say the national and state sales tax sum up to 20 percent (this is ridiculously low, by the way - in actuality, it'd be closer to 37 percent, but we'll use 20 as an easy math baseline).
If I'm poor, and make 1000 dollars a month, and buy 100 dollars worth of groceries, then I spend 120 dollars. That means that I now have 20 dollars less. That 20 dollars was a full 2 percent of my monthly income.

If I make 10000 dollars a month, and buy 100 dollars worth of groceries, and pay 20 dollars in taxes, then I have spent only 0.2 percent of my income.

So, you can see that while the poor and the rich me spent the same actual AMOUNT, we spent vastly different PERCENTAGES of our income on sales tax.

Contrast that with our current income tax, where in the first case I would pay nothing in income taxes (because of the standard deduction on the income tax return, and the ability I have to claim exemptions on my W-4s, which of course wouldn't exist on a sales-tax-only system). So, I would spend zero percent of my income on taxes.

Additionally, there's all of this talk about "refund checks" going out to poor people, so that their end-result taxation is zero. But our government takes six months to ship an empty box, and doesn't know where 12 million illegal aliens are, and can't even get me my tax return on time NOW. How can we be sure that they won't screw this up too? On a monthly basis? Ask the feds where the folks from Katrina are, and they'll shrug their shoulders. You trust this government to mail checks to the right people so they don't starve because they're supporting an unfair tax system that says it's fair?

There are much easier ways to simplify our current tax system. Getting rid of the AMT, for example (the tax, not the model company). Giving people the option to automate their tax returns (since the IRS has all of the information that we send them ANYWAY, including home interest tax, income, capital gains, whatever). Creating a percentage-additional tax system, where taxes are figured at one percentage to a certain income, then another percentage above that.

The Fair Tax system is a joke and an opportunity for the superwealthy to take home a higher percentage of income at the expense of the poor. Don't get suckered in.

Answer 5

When a politician or political type uses the word "fair" you need to run for cover. If you are making over $100K and don't much care about the poor and middle class this "fair" tax is likely something that you should support.

Answer 6

No.

A shift from our current tax system to a national sales tax would be disastrous to the economy. It would also create a huge black market for all goods and another huge government bureaucracy that would be bigger than the IRS is today.

Answer 7

No I don't - even with the "prebate" it still hits the poor and the middle class, and gives the wealthy a break. Plus the prebate has possibilities for massive fraud, and would need a major bureaucracy to administer - who is going to define "household" and enforce it?

Answer 8

I support a flat tax that each and every one pays the same.
Not taking form one to give to another. This is unjust and unfair.
Just like a bank robber or any other form of theft which is what the tax system is. Yes we need funding for many things that protects us all but to take more from one and give to others that do not pay into it is unjust.

Answer 9

I prefer the national sales tax proposed by Alan Keyes.

Answer 10

I support any initiative that eliminates the unfair tax also known as the federal income tax.