What is wrong with a flat tax? Isn't it fair that everyone pay the same percentage to the gov't?

Fair never ever has anything to do with it. It is always about lobbyists and buying votes among constituents.

A flat Income tax would be more fair than a flat sales tax, and here is why.

If it is a sales tax, it will be REgressive, where as now the system is Progressive.

A person who makes ten million dollars a year does NOT spend 100 times as much as a person who makes 100,000.00 That is why it would be regressive.

I DO believe that everyone should have Skin in the game, and then the DEMONcrats would not be able to buy votes by having the bottom half pay NOTHING, and OF COURSE, that group stays always ready to favor a tax increase on those who are paying for their free stuff.

People who are On public assistance should have to pay a small percentage of it back, JUST so that they have the feeling that they are part of the process, even if we have to increase the benefit to cover it. If they have to write a check on April 15 just like everybody else, it will make a lot more sense to them.

I really do not think most rich people mind paying more than the others all that much. Most understand the theory that "To whom much is given, much is expected in return" But to have the top ten percent pay 75% of the burden while the bottom HALF pays 3%, and then to ALWAYS suggest raising taxes on only the richest whenever we need more money, I am sure they are tired of that. Why are we Demonizing them? Getting rich USED to be the American Dream.

Knowing that the President is Gunning for all who make over 250,000.00 makes me want a job that pays no more than 249,999.99 In other words, it promotes mediocrity. (not that I think that 249G's is mediocre, but you know what I mean)

Has ANYONE ever been offered a job by someone who was Poorer than they are? The richer my boss gets, the better my job gets, unless the government takes it all away from him.

A flat tax and/or a lower and simpler overall tax rate would lift many struggling people out of poverty, would make the nation much more prosperous, would create many jobs and bring the U.S. economy up to a solid #1; but it will never happen because it would help some up and coming rich people with high incomes pay less taxes and those people suck and must be destroyed for social justice reasons. You notice there is no wealth tax, it's always an income tax. Besides it's not fair that the U.S. is prosperous.

News flash, the very rich will never pay large percentages of their income to the govt. they will always find a way around the tax and always have for all of history. If you tax them at lower rates it always results in more revenue for the Govt.

Here is the answer for those people who are guilty wealthy; give 10% of everything you earn to the poor. More if you want to feel even better. Don't force the world into your false socialist paradise that doesn't and will not ever exist.

It discourages the poor from ever getting out of the current situation, and raises taxes on the middle class above what they have ever been. It suppresses small middle class business owners. Only the super rich benefit from this system.

Think of it this way. The first 10 to 15 thousand a person earns goes exclusively toward necessities. If you take a cut of that money, children starve, and families have to decide between eating and paying basic bills for utilities. In a fair system you tax the luxuries. A progressive tax system is just that a flat tax of luxuries which works better. A poor person has very few luxuries therefore pays a very small percentage. A rich person has very few necessities and would pay a much higher rate.

And then there is the issue of tax credits and such. If you do a flat tax without exceptions, there are about 4 farming companies in the US that would survive. Those four companies already control half of all beef and pork production in the US. Instantly thousands would be out of work.

So there are a lot of issues surrounding this that would have to be carefully explored before making such a large change to prevent a huge amount of trauma.

Taxation is money seized at gunpoint from unwilling victims. It is no different from armed robbery in practice. Just as there can be no "fair robbery," there can be no "fair tax."

However, some taxes are better than others, if they are lower than the current taxes and/or less invasive. A low flat tax could accomplish this -- at least, until the politicians raised it again, which I think would take about six weeks!

But I favor a better solution: repeal the income tax altogether -- and replace it with NOTHING.

Is that feasible? I think so. America didn't have an income tax until well into the 20th century -- and without an income tax we quickly rose from a struggling ex-colony to become the most abundant nation in history.

Ron Paul, who has done more than any other elected official to advance this issue, made this point beautifully in 2001:

"Could America exist without an income tax? The idea seems radical, yet in truth America did just fine without a federal income tax for the first 126 years of its history. Prior to 1913, the government operated with revenues raised through tariffs, excise taxes, and property taxes, without ever touching a worker's paycheck."

http://www.house.gov/paul/tst/tst2001/tst050701.ht...

In fact, gov't has grown so fast in recent years we could just adopt a budget from ten years or so ago and eliminate the personal income tax:

Again, Ron Paul, this time from the New York Times, Nov. 20, 2008:

"We could eliminate the income tax, replace it with nothing, and still fund the same level of big government we had in the late 1990s. We don't need to 'replace' the income tax at all."

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/20/r...

in the late 1990s, when Bill Clinton was president, I don't remember many people complaining that government wasn't big enough, or complaining we had too little government.

Surely many people would be willing to reduce the federal government to the size it was in the last years of the Clinton administration -- if it meant we could abolish outright the personal income tax.

It is extremely hard work to build support for any form of bold tax reform, including the Flat Tax and Fair Tax. We may get just one shot at major tax reform in our lifetimes. So why not put our effort into building a movement for change that would dramatically limit government and increase freedom?

As the old saying goes, if you don't ask for what you really want, you'll never get it; but if you do ask, you might just get it all.

Ron Paul has introduced legislation, the Liberty Amendment, which would forbid the Federal government from performing any action not explicitly authorized by the United States Constitution. This would allow the abolition of the income tax, which the bill also does.

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?r111:E30AP9-...

I say, forget the flat tax and the Fair Tax. Let's go for the Liberty Amendment!

First, there is no right or wrong to this. It is a matter of perspective.

You see, no matter what your tax is, the basic costs of living still remain the same, and at a certain level. However, while tax on income may be flat, the cost of living is not tied to income. Someone making 1,500 dollars a month has a basic cost of living that they can afford. if someone makes 50,000 a month, they can also live off the same basic costs as someone making 1,500 a month. Granted, if you make 50,000 a month, your costs will also reflect your larger income, but it is not proportionate, and it is voluntary and considered luxury, and that is why the flat tax is not a fair tax.

For example, lets say for arguments sake that the basic costs of living single, no kids, is 1,500.00 a month. That includes everything needed to have the minimum necessities like food, water, electric, gas, rent, garbage pick up, clothing, and transportation to and from work. Say that you make 1,800.00 a month, so you have 300 dollars disposable income a month. If you are taxed at a flat tax rate of 20%, then that 300 disposable income is gone and you have a negative $60.00 a month you must come up with to make ends meet.

However, if you make 50,000 a month, then your basic costs that you volunteer to spend, based on your lifestyle, could cost you only 20,000 a month. That includes a mortgage for your mansion, the monthly bills, and food. Giving you a disposable income of 30,000 dollars. If you pay 20% on that, you will pay 10,000 a month, still giving you a disposable income of 20,000 a month, essentially giving you a 100% cushion on your total monthly expenses.

If we chose a flat tax system, then those who live right at the line where disposable income is razor thin, will not have enough to pay for their basic necessities, and we will have increased poverty. On the other end, those with enormous salaries will pay even less and have loads of more disposable income to play with.

The purpose of this is to make sure that everyone can afford to live. It is in our best interests to make sure that the worker can keep himself fed, so if they can only afford 1% of their income as taxes, then that is all we can reasonably ask them to pay. On the other hand, if a very rich person has 100,000 dollars disposable income, then they can afford to pay more in taxes.

It isn't about punishing the rich, and rewarding the poor. It is about keeping our society functional.

Kind of depends on your definition of fair. For me I don't think it is "fair" that some people are born into wealth. That wealth isn't taxed at the same rate, and will create more wealth over time. Since the rich can gain interest on their money, they can make more money in the market than they can in wages.

For example: a 25 year old inherits a small fortune from his father. Lets say it is 5 million dollars the amount they could get before inheritance taxes kick in. So this kid, not having earned it just came into 5 million tax free. Lets say he invests that money in a low risk hedge fund, lets say 7% before fees. So $350,000. The fee is lets say, 50k, so the kid now gets $300,000, but first we have to tax him. So he gets taxed at 15% which is 45K, so he is left at the end of the year with... $255,000. He can spend that or reinvest for even greater earnings next year. So he has 255K after taxes, based only on interest earned. He doesn't have to work at all.

In comparison a wealthy working man works all year and earns the same. $350,000. He though gets taxed at a rate of 35% which is $122,500. He ends up with $227,000 dollars at the end of the year.

So the tax code as it is now, is set up to make the rich richer. Now lets say its a flat tax. What is that tax on? Your total accumulated wealth or the gain you made that year? Is it based on the work you've done or the money which was lent?

I'd be down with a 15% annual wealth tax, where you have to pay 15% of your families net worth each year. That sounds completely fair actually but doubt that is what you are suggesting.

Here is a clip from the source listed below:

The notion of a flat tax does have a certain simplistic, egalitarian appeal. But it has three main flaws: 1) It seeks to improve something that is already completely equal; 2) It forces middle-class taxpayers to subsidize the wealthy (especially those incarnations such as Forbes' that exempt "unearned" income such as the interest on his invested inheritance, so that working people would support the idle rich); and, 3) It confuses much-needed tax reform and tax simplification in defining taxable income with the unrelated issue of whether the rate applied to that income is flat or graduated. Anyone who wants to support a flat tax better run the numbers first and see how much more they're going to pay!

The biggest problem is that the middle class would pay more and the upper class would pay less. Go sell that in this day and age.

The formula is (41*100)/300 The reason is 1% of 300 is 300/100. You want to know how many '1%s' are in 41, so you divide 41 by 300/100.

The flat tax would be a very good way to go,it would eliminate Federal income tax as we know it now,require less government,reduce the number of IRS agents for instance. I`m all for it.

What is "wrong" with it? There is nothing "wrong" with it. The progressive system is merely preferential because people need to pay for food, water, and shelter. You pay a certain percentage of taxes up to a certain amount and then you pay the next rate in the bracket for any money you make over that (ex. You pay 10% on the first $10,000, then 15% on the next 10,000). I have to write this because nearly every person I have encountered that argues against a progressive system doesn't have the slightest idea how it works.