Camp Tax Simplification Bill

[scott]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/house-gop-tax-plan-would-cut-top-rates-but-also-hit-high-earners-with-a-surtax/2014/02/24/361ac868-9d92-11e3-9ba6-800d1192d08b_story.html?hpid=z1

Unlikely to get any real traction, but fodder for discussion

[boutons_deux]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/house-gop-tax-plan-would-cut-top-rates-but-also-hit-high-earners-with-a-surtax/2014/02/24/361ac868-9d92-11e3-9ba6-800d1192d08b_story.html?hpid=z1

Unlikely to get any real traction, but fodder for discussion

GOP/Norquist/VRWC strategy to drown govt in a bathtub (that's govt drowned for the 99%, not for the govt-subsidized 1%)

[Th'Pusher]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/house-gop-tax-plan-would-cut-top-rates-but-also-hit-high-earners-with-a-surtax/2014/02/24/361ac868-9d92-11e3-9ba6-800d1192d08b_story.html?hpid=z1

Unlikely to get any real traction, but fodder for discussion

I'll be interested to see the details when the plan is released. Gotta know what loopholes are being closed. As of now, there is not a whole lot to get excited about.revenue neutral and They don't touch unearned income...

this would put a few tax accountants out of work and drop Intiut's share price, but really has no chance of passing, so good work guys.

[TeyshaBlue]

I'm with you, Push. Can't get real excited about a plan that's revenue neutral and the unearned income remaining untouched. Seems like a no-brainer...add the UI to the tax roll and keep the rest of the initiative as is...for starters.

[DarrinS]

I'm with you, Push. Can't get real excited about a plan that's revenue neutral and the unearned income remaining untouched. Seems like a no-brainer...add the UI to the tax roll and keep the rest of the initiative as is...for starters.


What is it you guys want done with unearned income?

[ElNono]

What is it you guys want done with unearned income?

Personally, I'd like it to see taxed as much as earned income, if not more. Just on the sole basis of promoting production over speculation.

[DarrinS]

Personally, I'd like it to see taxed as much as earned income, if not more. Just on the sole basis of promoting production over speculation.


Not all investors are Warren Buffett or Charles Koch.

[ElNono]

Not all investors are Warren Buffett or Charles Koch.

so?

[DarrinS]

so?


And there are other things like retirement benefits, alimony, workers' comp., unemployment benefits, etc. that are considered unearned income.

[Wild Cobra]

so?
Wow.

That obviously means you don't understand the complexities.

[ElNono]

And there are other things like retirement benefits, alimony, workers' comp., unemployment benefits, etc. that are considered unearned income.

Let's start with dividends and interest... and go from there.

[ElNono]

Wow.

:lmao

[boutons_deux]

Let's start with dividends and interest... and go from there.

and estate taxes.

If there was one thing the Revolutionary generation agreed on — and those guys who dress up like them at Tea Party conventions most definitely do not — it was the incompatibility of democracy and inherited wealth.

With Thomas Jefferson taking the lead in the Virginia legislature in 1777, every Revolutionary state government abolished the laws of primogeniture and entail that had served to perpetuate the concentration of inherited property. Jefferson cited Adam Smith, the hero of free market capitalists everywhere, as the source of his conviction that (as Smith wrote, and Jefferson closely echoed in his own words), "A power to dispose of estates for ever is manifestly absurd. The earth and the fulness of it belongs to every generation, and the preceding one can have no right to bind it up from posterity. Such extension of property is quite unnatural." Smith said: "There is no point more difficult to account for than the right we conceive men to have to dispose of their goods after death."

The states left no doubt that in taking this step they were giving expression to a basic and widely shared philosophical belief that equality of citizenship was impossible in a nation where inequality of wealth remained the rule. North Carolina's 1784 statute explained that by keeping large estates together for succeeding generations, the old system had served "only to raise the wealth and importance of particular families and individuals, giving them an unequal and undue influence in a republic" and promoting "contention and injustice." Abolishing aristocratic forms of inheritance would by contrast "tend to promote that equality of property which is of the spirit and principle of a genuine republic."

Others wanted to go much further; Thomas Paine, like Smith and Jefferson, made much of the idea that landed property itself was an affront to the natural right of each generation to the usufruct of the earth, and proposed a "ground rent" — in fact an inheritance tax — on property at the time it is conveyed at death, with the money so collected to be distributed to all citizens at age 21, "as a compensation in part, for the loss of his or her natural inheritance, by the introduction of the system of landed property."

Even stalwart members of the latter-day Republican Party, the representatives of business and inherited wealth, often emphatically embraced these tenets of economic equality in a democracy. I've mentioned Herbert Hoover's disdain for the "idle rich" (http://budiansky.blogspot.com/2010/09/hoover-days-are-here-again.html)and his strong support for breaking up large fortunes. Theodore Roosevelt, who was the first president to propose a steeply graduated tax on inheritances, was another: he declared that the transmission of large wealth to young men "does not do them any real service and is of great and genuine detriment to the community at large.''

In her debate in Delaware yesterday, the Republican Senate candidate Christine O'Donnell asserted that the estate tax is a "tenet of Marxism (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/13/AR2010101308120.html)." I'm not sure how much Marx she has read, but she might want to read the works of his fellow travelers Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Herbert Hoover, and Theodore Roosevelt before her next debate.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/lexington/2010/10/estate_tax_and_founding_fathers

[Winehole23]

Okay, so hedge funds are a scam to soak rich people who are not sophisticated enough to understand that they are not sophisticated. Big deal, right? Even Businessweek magazine (http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-07-11/why-hedge-funds-glory-days-may-be-gone-for-good)came to that unavoidable conclusion. I don't particularly care about wealthy people throwing their money away on poor investments; I care about the fact that all of that money is being deposited directly into the pockets of even richer people, who pay less tax on it than a mechanic pays on his paycheck. Most hedge fund earnings fall under the "carried interest (http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/briefing-book/key-elements/business/carried-interest.cfm)" tax loophole, meaning they're taxed at about half the rate of regular income. Ongoing efforts to close that loophole (http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2014/02/26/Camp-s-Tax-Plan-Hits-Hedge-Funds-Private-Equity-Gut) attract the most vociferous form of opposition lobbying from Wall Street, which can be explained by greed, and nothing else.


Last year, the 25 highest-earning hedge fund managers collectively earned $24.3 billion (http://www.forbes.com/sites/nathanvardi/2014/02/26/the-highest-earning-hedge-fund-managers-and-traders/). Assuming that most of that was taxed as carried interest rather than as income, that means that this tiny group of people by themselves cost the government billions of dollars in tax revenue that would have been paid under a fairer system of taxation. As a matter of fact, you could fund the entire budget (http://www.unhcr.org/pages/49c3646c11.html)of the UN Refugee Agency with just the amount of tax money that stayed in the pockets of these hedge funders because of that tax loophole.


This is where private financial swashbuckling meets the public good. One side will win, and one side will lose. To defer to the bank accounts of a tiny group of insanely rich hedge funders over the needs of the public at large is insane. This week, economists at the IMF issued a new report (http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/sdn/2014/sdn1402.pdf)that finds that redistribution of income has a "statistically insignificant (http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/feb/26/imf-inequality-economic-growth)" effect on economic growth—in other words, that policies designed to combat economic inequality, like high taxes on the very rich, do not hurt a nation's overall economy. "Rather than a trade-off [between economic growth and economic inequality]" they write, "the average result across the sample is a win-win situation, in which redistribution has an overall pro-growth effect, counting both potential negative direct effects and positive effects of the resulting lower inequality."


If wealth can be redistributed within a society without harming that society's overall economy, a key pillar of right wing economic argument is destroyed. It is a given that our society is not fair. It does not offer equality of opportunity, nor equality of outcome. Knowing that, what we can do is pursue equality on the back end, by taking some from those who have way too much, and giving it to those in desperate need. An extremely mild way to do this is to tax hedge funders at normal tax rates. By keeping that money in their own pockets, they are making themselves into enemies of the public. Our current system, in which teachers can barely lead middle class lifestyles, but a man (http://www.forbes.com/pictures/mdg45eejfh/3-steve-cohen/)whose firm is knee-deep in insider trading practices can earn $2.3 billion per year while paying lower tax rates than those teachers, is unconscionable.


The biggest thugs of all operate fully within the law.

http://gawker.com/hedge-fund-managers-are-the-biggest-gangsters-of-all-1532392791

[Winehole23]

Camp's proposal doesn't touch payroll taxes, which is a bigger burden to most than income taxes, and makes hiring more expensive than perhaps it need be.

[CosmicCowboy]

I don't see how they can say it's revenue neutral without defining deductions. If it truly eliminated deductions it would slaughter the middle class. A true 25% tax rate would be oppressive. Under the current code even though I have a decent six figure income my effective income tax rate is usually around 12-13%. 25% would be a killer.

[Wild Cobra]

Camp's proposal doesn't touch payroll taxes, which is a bigger burden to most than income taxes, and makes hiring more expensive than perhaps it need be.
Unless you are going to replace it with something that taxes everyone in some manner, leave it alone. If anything, with the forecasts, it needs to be increased. Maybe as high as 8%.

[Winehole23]

I don't see how they can say it's revenue neutral without defining deductions. If it truly eliminated deductions it would slaughter the middle class. A true 25% tax rate would be oppressive. Under the current code even though I have a decent six figure income my effective income tax rate is usually around 12-13%. 25% would be a killer.haven't had a chance to go through it myself, but more detailed info can be found here: https://www.jct.gov/publications.html

[Winehole23]

skimming, looks like there's considerable detail re: deductions

[Wild Cobra]

I don't see how they can say it's revenue neutral without defining deductions. If it truly eliminated deductions it would slaughter the middle class. A true 25% tax rate would be oppressive. Under the current code even though I have a decent six figure income my effective income tax rate is usually around 12-13%. 25% would be a killer.
Well, I pay an effective 13% federal income tax, have less income, and don't have all those write-off you have. I only have my standard deduction, exemption, and 401k. I think my medical is also tax deductible. My effective state tax rate is 6.4%.

I hate paying 5 figures in federal income tax, but that's the way it is. My fear is that we will be forced to pay even more as the 47% becomes over 50%.

I remember long ago, when a flat tax was being floated in the early 90's, they were taking about a 17% flat tax rate of all income over $30k. I would much prefer something so simplistic over what we have now. I always thought the $30k for 1992 was too much though.

[Winehole23]

But in its current incarnation, the plan is fundamentally flawed. First, it claims to be revenue neutral, but achieves that goal only with timing gimmicks that ensure that its revenue neutrality will not last. Second, revenue neutrality is itself a recipe for an unsustainable budget path. Our demographics alone, not to mention growing challenges like climate change, imply future demands on government programs that clearly show neutrality to be a misguided guidepost for tax reform (http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3990).http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/02/26/the-promise-and-pitfalls-in-a-tax-reform-plan/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0

[Wild Cobra]

When a new tax plan claims to be too good to be true... watch out. It's just a gimmick.

Regardless what they do, the revenue will average about 18.3% of GNP (or is that GDP?) when the dust settles.

[ElNono]

Wall Street threatens GOP on bank tax

Wall Street is warning Washington Republicans: The money spigot is turning off.
Rep. Dave Camp’s tax proposal — which jacked up taxes on banks and threatens the bottom line of some major private equity players in New York — has infuriated donors in high finance.

Private equity and investment firms in New York are telling key Republican players in D.C. that commitments for big-dollar fundraising have been “canceled for the foreseeable future,” according to one GOP lobbyist with knowledge of the conversations.

...

Without Wall Street, Republicans risk their coffers emptying. The securities and investment industry is the largest contributor — besides candidate committees — to the National Republican Congressional Committee this cycle, directing $3.5 million to the party committee, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. In the 2012 election cycle, the financial services industry ponied up nearly $9.9 million.

...

Some House Republicans are already trying to calm the waters.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) told lobbyists at a lunch in D.C. Thursday that Camp’s bill was merely a “draft.” One lobbyist in attendance got the impression Cantor thought the plan was going nowhere. Rory Cooper, Cantor’s spokesman, said he didn’t say this “directly or indirectly.”

Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said that since the legislation isn’t going to be voted on — lawmakers can use it as a talking point.

“It allows you to tell your energy people ‘Look, I’m on your side,’” Cole said. “It lets you distance yourself from parts that are unpopular.”

...

Other Republicans are trying to isolate Camp, saying it’s his draft, and doesn’t represent the view of the party, writ large.

Key Republicans involved in fundraising — like Texas Rep. Roger Williams — are trying to minimize the damage with donors.

“I’m telling my guys — look, we gotta win on Nov. 4 so don’t get way out there, OK? This is a work in process,” Williams said in an interview. “I would just say to those that are frustrated, and I’ve heard it too, it’s a work in process is all it is. It’s not a final draft. It’s some ideas.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2014/02/wall-street-republicans-dave-camp-bank-tax-reform-104065.html

[boutons_deux]

Wall Street threatens GOP on bank tax

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2014/02/wall-street-republicans-dave-camp-bank-tax-reform-104065.html

yawn:

private, corporate $$$ make govt policy to protect/enrich Corporate-Amercans and the 1% or 5% by OWNING the politics AND the politicians. Human-Americans and their votes are a dog-and-pony show to fool the sheeple that every vote counts (for those that can even qualify for voting and get to the polls).

[boutons_deux]

The simple math that tells you the new GOP tax plan is a scam

Here's the easiest calculation. Camp says he's eliminating the preferential tax rate on capital gains, and taxing them the same as ordinary income. That would be a big philosophical change and a big tax hike on the rich, if it were true.

It's not true.

Camp's plan exempts 40% of capital gains (and investment dividends) from any taxation at all. How does this work out in real numbers? The top marginal tax rate on married taxpayers today is 39.6% (couples with more than $457,600 income). The top capital gains rate is 20%.

Camp wants to cut the top marginal rate to 35%. If you tax capital gains at 35%, but exempt 40% of them from any tax, your effective rate on all capital gains works out to (... wait for i t...) 21%. In other words, Camp is raising the standard cap gains rate by a single percentage point. But since he's also cutting the top rate on all income by nearly five percentage points, rich taxpayers still come out ahead.

What's especially stealthy about this tax break is that capital gains and other investment income account for a far higher share of total income for the wealthy than for average taxpayers.

According to IRS statistics for 2011 (the latest published), taxpayers earning between $75,000 and $100,000 received less than 1% of their income from the sales of capital assets on average, and 77% from wages and salary. For the average taxpayer in the $1 million to $1.5 million range, capital gains were more than 11% of income, and wages and salary less than half. For the taxpayer reporting $10 million or more, cap gains accounted for nearly half of all income, and wages and salary only 17%.

Camp also proposes tinkering with tax deductions and increasing the standard deduction; we'll leave it to Washington's cadre of expert number-crunchers to determine how each of these provisions affects taxpayers at various income levels. But Camp is candid about wishing to "flatten" tax rates -- that is, make them less progressive.

That's a dead giveaway that this plan benefits the rich more than anyone else, because it continues a long-term trend toward relieving them of their share of the overall tax burden. This has been documented by Emmanuel Saez of UC Berkeley; a graphic representation of the decline in the U.S. tax system's progressivity from 1970 to 2004 can be found here.

Camp also tries to slip a few other bennies for the wealthy into his tax plan, possibly hoping that no one will read that deeply into the text. But keep an eye out for the changes he makes in the rules for 501(c)4 "social welfare" nonprofits.
...

http://touch.latimes.com/#section/1780/article/p2p-79447462/?related=true

[dbestpro]

We always hear about tax simplification from the right, but I am curious what would be considered tax simplification from the left? Not a setup, just curious.

[ElNono]

We always hear about tax simplification from the right, but I am curious what would be considered tax simplification from the left? Not a setup, just curious.

this is the bullshit Pelosi was peddling back when dubya was the prez:

http://www.okfairtax.org/dem_leadership_letter.pdf

[boutons_deux]

The US tax code, like the economy as a whole, has been rigged by the corporations and wealthy to their advantage. Complexity, opacity are always the goals.

Reform is simply, practically impossible.

Repug "reform" is nothing but more tax cutting for the corporations and wealthy, towards extreme regressiveness, to starve the govt of any power to protect Human-Americans and the environment against corporate predations.

[Wild Cobra]

The US tax code, like the economy as a whole, has been rigged by the corporations and wealthy to their advantage. Complexity, opacity are always the goals.

Reform is simply, practically impossible.

Repug "reform" is nothing but more tax cutting for the corporations and wealthy, towards extreme regressiveness, to starve the govt of any power to protect Human-Americans and the environment against corporate predations.
So do you agree it's a reason to take away all deductions above a certain dollar amount?

[boutons_deux]

So do you agree it's a reason to take away all deductions above a certain dollar amount?

That's one approach, but I won't get into purely imaginative, sterile tax policy discussions since "Reform is simply, practically impossible."

As with for-profit disease care, the US tax policies are so mind-bogglingly complex, opaque, ossified, and enormous, it's hard to know where to start.

Anyway, the Repugs, as they have sworn to Grovel-Before-Me TittyQuist, will block any tax increases, closing any loopholes, cutting any DoD expenditures, taxing the finance industry, etc, etc.

You People simply refuse to see how irredeemably FUCKED AND UNFUCKABLE America and it's 95% are, as well as not having ANY PRACTICAL suggestions how to proceed, which means you really agree America is fucked and unfuckable.

[Wild Cobra]

That's one approach, but I won't get into purely imaginative, sterile tax policy discussions since "Reform is simply, practically impossible."

As with for-profit disease care, the US tax policies are so mind-bogglingly complex, opaque, ossified, and enormous, it's hard to know where to start.

Anyway, the Repugs, as they have sworn to Grovel-Before-Me TittyQuist, will block any tax increases, closing any loopholes, cutting any DoD expenditures, taxing the finance industry, etc, etc.

You People simply refuse to see how irredeemably FUCKED AND UNFUCKABLE America and it's 95% are, as well as not having ANY PRACTICAL suggestions how to proceed, which means you really agree America is fucked and unfuckable.

How about this.

What ever tax deductions someone has, everyone pay a minimum 2%, minimum 5% above $40k, and minimum 10% above 60k, and a maximum of 15%?

[TeyshaBlue]

Um..no.

[TeyshaBlue]

Address the tax loopholes.... redefine income to include investment income, eliminate any deductions for income over a defined limit (500k?) for a start. Then we can begin to work brackets.

[TeyshaBlue]

Shoot me down Winehole! Scott, you can take the next shot.:lol

[Winehole23]

those sound like good ideas to me, TB

[TeyshaBlue]

Dammit!:ihit

[baseline bum]

That's one approach, but I won't get into purely imaginative, sterile tax policy discussions since "Reform is simply, practically impossible."

As with for-profit disease care, the US tax policies are so mind-bogglingly complex, opaque, ossified, and enormous, it's hard to know where to start.

Anyway, the Repugs, as they have sworn to Grovel-Before-Me TittyQuist, will block any tax increases, closing any loopholes, cutting any DoD expenditures, taxing the finance industry, etc, etc.

You People simply refuse to see how irredeemably FUCKED AND UNFUCKABLE America and it's 95% are, as well as not having ANY PRACTICAL suggestions how to proceed, which means you really agree America is fucked and unfuckable.




We must be making progress since the top 5% are unfucked when it used to be only the top 1% tbh. Thanks Obama.

[boutons_deux]

We must be making progress since the top 5% are unfucked when it used to be only the top 1% tbh. Thanks Obama.

0.1%, 1%, 95%, whatever.

95%ile is $185K+, 3x+ the housedhold median.

the % is symbolic, not literal, of Wealthy Class Warfare on the non-wealthy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United_States

[Winehole23]

The reaction by Democrats was in part a tribal reaction: If he is for it, we can't be. For many of them, Camp in other venues has been a hard-driving partisan, shutting out Democrats from actions on the committee (in sharp contrast from how Dan Rostenkowski treated Republicans during consideration of tax reform leading up to 1986.) Camp has vied with Darrell Issa in over-the-top partisan actions and rhetoric against the IRS. But even so, this was a serious plan with a lot for Democrats to like.


The other element, I suspect, is that Democrats don't have a lot of interest in tax reform that is revenue neutral. It will inevitably create winners and losers, and some of those losers will be Democratic voters, especially as rate reductions lead to capping or eliminating popular deductions like the state and local tax deduction or the one for mortgage interest. Democrats, including the president, see tax reform as a vehicle to get revenues, as part of a larger bargain to reduce the long-term debt. Embrace revenue-neutral tax reform, and you give up the best vehicle to achieve the greater goal.


For Republicans in Congress, any impulse to embrace or even say good things about the Camp plan was quashed quickly by the GOP monied interests whose oxen were gored by the plan—including hedge-fund billionaires hit by the changes in tax treatment of carried interest (remember, an idea that billionaire Stephen Schwarzman once equated to Hitler invading Poland), and the big banks hit by the Camp idea to tax the "too big to fail" financial institutions that escaped unscathed in the financial meltdown. As Chait details in his column, "Wall Street unleashed a furious campaign to destroy and isolate Camp, canceling all fundraisers for the party until his fellow members agreed to denounce his heresy." Soon, a passel of House Republicans, Camp's friends and neighbors, sent him a letter denouncing his plan, and embracing their version of crony capitalism.


The problem goes beyond the usual bipartisan dynamic of special interests jerking the chains of their buddies on Capitol Hill.

But the problem goes beyond the usual bipartisan dynamic of special interests jerking the chains of their buddies on Capitol Hill. For Republicans in Congress, problem-solving is simply not high on the priority list. Real efforts at problem solving require recognizing that your desire to fulfill your ideological beliefs must fit the tradeoffs and realities of the real world. And it means that ideas—when subject to tests like making the numbers add up without manipulation or rank dishonesty—require adjustments, compromises, and pain for your friends and supporters.


There is a laziness that comes with being in the minority—you don't have to make tough choices; you can simply rail against everything done by the majority. Governing means making tough choices, and it is clear that despite their House majority, congressional Republicans are not ready to do that, either on immigration, tax reform, jobs programs, or health policy. Nor have they been willing to embrace the innovative ideas coming from the conservative intellectual and policy community.


We will see, in coming weeks, if that assertion is wrong across the board. Will Paul Ryan and the House Republicans come up with their own budget this year? And most importantly, will the promise to come up with a real health-reform alternative—meaning not vague principles or a set of talking points, but a real bill, scored by the Congressional Budget Office and subject to strict scrutiny by health policy analysts and the provider community—be met? The early returns are not promising; instead of a bill this spring, we are going to see a "listening tour" around the country. "Listening tour" is politispeak for "We are not serious.http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/03/the-rise-and-precipitous-fall-of-serious-bipartisan-tax-reform/284525/

[boutons_deux]

"Will Paul Ryan and the House Republicans come up with their own budget this year?"

:lol It's an election year, when House Repugs, it leadership accomplish even less than the zero they accomplish in a non-election year.

[SnakeBoy]

Address the tax loopholes.... redefine income to include investment income, eliminate any deductions for income over a defined limit (500k?) for a start. Then we can begin to work brackets.

Not bad. Although I would rather see capital gains over some arbitrary amount, let's say 100k, taxed as income and below that amount not taxed at all. Make it easier for the little guy to build wealth.

[Winehole23]

:tu

[boutons_deux]

FTT, financial transaction tax, and a significant one, to dampen the scam of high-speed trading.

[Th'Pusher]

Not bad. Although I would rather see capital gains over some arbitrary amount, let's say 100k, taxed as income and below that amount not taxed at all. Make it easier for the little guy to build wealth.
You mean the little guy who sits at home all day trading stocks while his wife provides for his family?

[SnakeBoy]

You mean the little guy who sits at home all day trading stocks while his wife provides for his family?

Sure, or any other little guy.

[Bito Corleone]

I'm curious what people would think of something like the following:

Eliminate all deductions except for the standard deduction, which could then be set as a percentage of gross income (let’s say 10%)

Eliminate all tax credits except for the EIC, and child tax credit, but limit the child tax credit at 2 children to encourage zero population growth in an already overpopulated county, as well as discourage the people who spit out kid after kid just for the free money.

Set marginal tax brackets at a factor of 10 for earned income:
0% up to $10k,
15% on $10k+ to $100k,
20% on $100k+ to $1mm
25% on $1mm+ to $10mm
30% on $10mm+ to $100mm
35% on $100mm to $1B
40% on $1B+ (rate capped @ 40%)

Apply the same principal as above for unearned income, but revert rates by one bracket:
0% up to $100k
15% on $100k+ to $1mm
20% on $1mm+ to $10mm
25% on $10mm+ to $100mm
30% on $100mm to $1B
35% on $1B+ (rate capped @ 35%)

Apply the same as above for corporate tax rates, but reduce rates by 5%.
0% up to $100k
10% on $100k+ to $1mm
15% on $1mm+ to $10mm
20% on $10mm+ to $100mm
25% on $100mm to $1B
30% on $1B+ (rate capped @ 30%)

*I obviously don’t have the resources to calculate how this would increase or decrease tax revenues. The rates I’ve used are better suited to display a concept of how one could drastically simplify the tax code, but still keep it progressive enough to not over-burden the poor.

[SnakeBoy]

I'm curious what people would think of something like the following:

Eliminate all deductions except for the standard deduction, which could then be set as a percentage of gross income (let’s say 10%)

Eliminate all tax credits except for the EIC, and child tax credit, but limit the child tax credit at 2 children to encourage zero population growth in an already overpopulated county, as well as discourage the people who spit out kid after kid just for the free money.

Set marginal tax brackets at a factor of 10 for earned income:
0% up to $10k,
15% on $10k+ to $100k,
20% on $100k+ to $1mm
25% on $1mm+ to $10mm
30% on $10mm+ to $100mm
35% on $100mm to $1B
40% on $1B+ (rate capped @ 40%)

Apply the same principal as above for unearned income, but revert rates by one bracket:
0% up to $100k
15% on $100k+ to $1mm
20% on $1mm+ to $10mm
25% on $10mm+ to $100mm
30% on $100mm to $1B
35% on $1B+ (rate capped @ 35%)

Apply the same as above for corporate tax rates, but reduce rates by 5%.
0% up to $100k
10% on $100k+ to $1mm
15% on $1mm+ to $10mm
20% on $10mm+ to $100mm
25% on $100mm to $1B
30% on $1B+ (rate capped @ 30%)

*I obviously don’t have the resources to calculate how this would increase or decrease tax revenues. The rates I’ve used are better suited to display a concept of how one could drastically simplify the tax code, but still keep it progressive enough to not over-burden the poor.

Basically a flat progressive tax code which I like. More brackets on earned income starting with only 5% on the lower end, and a max rate of 30% for all types of income would be better imo.

It'll never happen but we can pretend our govt is capable of making sense.

[boutons_deux]

the tax system is so rigged now to favor the 1% and corps as the owners of Congress that the tax system is untouchable, except to lower the taxes on the 1% and corps and raise taxes on the 99% (aka, Ryan's multiple budgets, including ALL his next ones).

[Winehole23]

More than 50 Republican lawmakers sent a letter Friday to House Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp (R., Mich.) saying they are “deeply concerned” about a proposed tax on banks they worry would undermine lending and curb economic growth.

The letter from Rep. Patrick McHenry (R., N.C.), a member of the House Financial Services Committee and co-signed by 53 House Republicans is the latest GOP pushback on Mr. Camp’s Feb. 26 proposal to overhaul the tax code (http://camp.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=370994). Included in the proposal is a quarterly tax on financial firms with assets greater than $500 billion.

http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/03/14/gop-lawmakers-hit-fellow-republican-over-bank-tax-idea/

[boutons_deux]

http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/03/14/gop-lawmakers-hit-fellow-republican-over-bank-tax-idea/

:lol

[boutons_deux]

TurboTax Maker Linked to ‘Grassroots’ Campaign Against Free, Simple Tax Filing

Over the last year, a rabbi, a state NAACP official, a small town mayor and other community leaders wrote op-eds and letters to Congress with remarkably similar language on a remarkably obscure topic.

Each railed against a long-standing proposal that would give taxpayers the option to use pre-filled tax returns. They warned that the program would be a conflict of interest for the IRS and would especially hurt low-income people, who wouldn't have the resources to fight inaccurate returns. Rabbi ****** Dorff wrote in a Jewish Journal (http://www.jewishjournal.com/opinion/item/irs_return_free_bad_for_most_vulnerable) op-ed (http://www.jewishjournal.com/opinion/item/irs_return_free_bad_for_most_vulnerable) that he "shudder[s] at the impact this program will have on the most vulnerable people in American society."

"It's alarming and offensive" that the IRS would target the "the most vulnerable Americans," two other letters said. The concept, known as return-free filing, is a government "experiment" that would mean higher taxes for the poor, two op-eds argued.

GRAPHIC
Op-Eds and Letters Opposing Return-Free Tax Filing (https://projects.propublica.org/graphics/tax-letters)
Compare eight letters and op-eds against return-free tax filing have been written by community leaders over the last year.

http://www.propublica.org/images/uploads/turbotax_graphic_315x200_140414.png (https://projects.propublica.org/graphics/tax-letters)

The letters and op-eds don't mention that, as ProPublica laid out last year (http://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax-fought-free-simple-tax-filing), return-free filing might allow tens of millions of Americans to file their taxes for free and in minutes. Or that, under proposals authored by several federal lawmakers, it would be voluntary, using information the government already receives from banks and employers and that taxpayers could adjust. Or that the concept has been endorsed by Presidents Obama and Reagan and is already a reality in some parts of Europe.

So, where did the letters and op-eds come from? Here's one clue:

Rabbi Dorff says he was approached by a former student, Emily Pflaster, who sent him details and asked him to write an op-ed alerting the Jewish community to the threat.
What Pflaster did not tell him is that she works for a PR and lobbying firm with connections to Intuit, the maker of best-selling tax software TurboTax.

"I wish she would have told me that," Dorff told ProPublica.

The website of Pflaster's firm, JCI Worldwide, had listed Intuit among its clients (http://www.propublica.org/documents/item/1109201-jci-pr-what-we-do-intuit.html#document/p1/a153391), but removed it after ProPublica contacted them. Pflaster said Intuit had been listed by mistake, but added that the firm does work for the Computer & Communications Industry Association (http://www.ccianet.org/)(CCIA), a trade group of which Intuit is a member. Pflaster also said her firm has reached out to multiple groups and encouraged them to share information about the "flaws" of return-free filing.

The only CCIA member (http://www.ccianet.org/about/members/) that's involved with tax preparation software is Intuit, and it's also the only member of the group that has taken a public position on return-free tax filing.
Intuit has long worked against return-free filing. (See How the Maker of TurboTax Fought Free, Simple Tax Filing (http://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax-fought-free-simple-tax-filing).) The company has said in filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (http://www.propublica.org/documents/item/621233-intuit-10k#document/p18/a95901) that it views free government tax preparation as a risk to its business.

Last year, the company spent more than $2.6 million on lobbying, some of it to lobby on four bills related to the issue, federal lobbying records show.

Both Intuit and CCIA declined to answer questions about their connections to the letters and op-eds. An Intuit spokeswoman, Julie Miller, said in an emailed statement that Intuit works with many types of groups to support "taxpayer empowerment," and "we feel all points of view deserve to be heard."

"Return Free minimizes the taxpayers' voice and instead maximizes revenue collection for government," Miller wrote (http://www.propublica.org/documents/item/1105522-intuit-statement-2014-return-free-opeds.html). "That kind of anti-consumer policy does not advance taxpayer rights."

...

http://www.propublica.org/article/turbotax-maker-linked-to-grassroots-campaign-against-free-simple-tax-filing?utm_source=et&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dailynewsletter