Would you be willing to abolish the current tax system in favor of this?

Question

A National sales tax of 20% on everything except food, clothing, rent, mortage payments for primary residence only and any medical related issues such as perscriptions or doctors visits. The 20% would give 10% to federal, 5% to the state and 5% to local {city if you live in town, county if you do not}. No exemptions for anything, and cap the tax to only the first $5,000 of big ticket purchases.

Judy yes you could buy a $1,000,000 house and not pay tax on It And a mink coat? (Not that I'd want one) And some zillionaire can rent a Manhattan penthouse across from Central Park and he / she pays tax if it is a second Home. Rmember each of those "rich people" that buy all that stuff are keeping other people in jobs!

Answer 1

The current tax burden for all kids of taxes is about 1/3 of the gross national product so 20% won't work.

Answer 2

Uh, no for a variety of reasons. First of all, if the federal got 10% of this national sales tax, they'd have to reduce services by well over half of the current amounts. Secondly, this scheme would hit the poor hard and the middle class pretty hard, giving a huge tax break to the rich.

Third, you except food, clothing, rent, mortgage payments. So I can buy a $1,000,000 house and not pay tax on that? And a mink coat? (Not that I'd want one) And some zillionaire can rent a Manhattan penthouse across from Central Park, and the rest of the taxpayers will subsidize that? You say "no exceptions for anything" and then proceed to leave some pretty big gaps.

Answer 3

No, it is unfair to those that have saved money. We paid income tax when we earned our life savings and to make us pay another 20% would be unfair. My local sales tax is 8.9% so I don't think you having the federal tax go to the state is fair since that would give them twice the money.