Trying before leaving tonight to get through all the pooge that came into my e-mail account over the last couple of days, and am struck by the releases from various ideologues, from libertarians to our current GOP Chairman, Katon Dawson, going on and on what they call "Tax Day," which normal people with a healthy sense of perspective call "April 15."
Let me tell you something, folks: First, paying your taxes is no big, freaking deal. It’s a thing that grownups do without thinking much about it, understanding that it’s just something you do because you live in a place that has more public, civilizing amenities than, say, Somalia.
Second, I don’t know about you, but most of us pay our taxes through payroll deduction. And I’ve never had any trouble getting the bean-counters to take out a little more from my paycheck than necessary each payday, and so my tax return gets filed in January, and by this time of year, I get a nice little check back. It’s kind of nice.
In other words, it’s called a clue; look into it.
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“And I’ve never had any trouble getting the bean-counters to take out a little more from my paycheck than necessary each payday, and so my tax return gets filed in January, and by this time of year, I get a nice little check back. It’s kind of nice.”
And the problem with that is that you have given the government an interest-free loan with YOUR money. When the government takes too much in taxes, you are essentially loaning YOUR money to the government. Granted they pay back the principal, but why should the government get to free ride on YOUR money?
It depends on how much you pay, I think.
I live conservativly, but work hard, and smart. And I pay well into the 6 figures. And what do I get for that…not much. I use the road, but pay a gas tax. I fly, but pay air taxes…everything I do I pay additional taxes for…and it never stops.
I am not one of those that coplains about it…but for goodness sake, don’t ask me to like it.
Having to research the bases for more than 50 stock/bond sales was a “big, freaking deal” to me. Some people aren’t just employees. Some people have investments outside the payroll deduction scheme.
In fact, some people aren’t on anybody’s payroll at all. They run their lives rather than have their lives run for them, or they ruin their lives rather than have their lives ruined for them.
Yes, some people have more than just a clue. They don’t purposefully use the government as an interest-free savings account.
Sometimes you’re beyond moronic, Brad. I spent a month working with accountants on year-end taxes, and will pay them thousands to comply with IRS requirements that make business ownership an ordeal beyond your experience or comprehension. It’s a totally f***-ed up system that inflates the cost of everything we do. If you don’t know what you’re talking about, please don’t post such idiocy.
Brad never ran a business, never created a job, never had the responsibility of meeting a payroll. Like a child, it all looks simple to him.
CCH estimates that 10% of the entire workforce in America is devoted to tax accounting. What a waste of resources, which makes America 10% less efficient than countries with simpler tax systems.
kill the lawers, and tax accountants, too, for they are but the notaries of Caesar.
Brad – you’re view on taxes is in the extreme minority. And your callous attitude toward people who expect government to be efficient, fair, and useful is just plain wrong.
Can you really not comprehend that other people might have a different experience than yours with the tax system? That some of us pay upwards of 40% of our incomes in taxes and get little in return? That we have a multi billion dollar industry whose sole purpose is to help people avoid paying taxes?
This may rank as the most off the wall post you’ve ever made.
Wait, I get it now… you’re trying to get to the 1,000,000 page views faster.
And next time you rail about the insurance industry, please realize that for many of us it’s as simple to deal with as your tax experience this year. Paying for health care is something grownups do as well.. and my insurance is paid for directly out of my check just like your taxes… in fact, I get extra money taken out tax free to pay for health care and I get to spend it BEFORE it even is all collected for the year.
Perhaps you might consider getting a clue on that topic.
Nothing is certain but death and texes, and death is a big deal, so taxes must be, too.
I hear it’s also a big deal if you don’t file.
But I would never call anyone a bean counter, so what do I know?
Money changers in the temple, that’s one thing. But bean counters at a business, that’s by definition. Grownups understand that without thinking about it.
Brad, I have to go with Gordon and Lee on this one. The cost of compliance with tax laws, particularly for small businesses like mine, is onerous.
This is just another example of Brad’s partisan favoritism of big government. That’s right, I used the P-word and I don’t appologize one whit for it. This post has me boiling with rage. Sorry Brad, but this is just to obvious to allow it to slide. If you don’t want to appear partisan please stop with all your condescending endorsements of more and more government intrusion into our lives. It really is disgusting.
We enlist the aid of lawyers and accountants to guide us through the tax-code minefield our legislators have created.
“The art of taxation consists in so plucking the goose to obtain the largest amount of feathers with the least possible amount of hissing.” — Jean-Baptiste Colbert
Brad, My friend it looks like you stepped into it knee deep this time. Just take a shower, go back to bed and when you wake up try it again.
Umm, pardon me, but yes, it is a big deal when self employed people like myself have to spend so much time and money complying with all the complex tax laws. Sure, from your perspective its easy as emlplyee…just make and adjustment to the withholdings, and like magic, you get money back from the government….aren’t you lucky.
The rest of us that risk our capital and provide jobs for people like you don’t have it so easy. Its quite obvious you’ve never created a job or run a business.
I find it amazing you think its no big that many of us pay more than 50% of our income to local, state and federal government. Yeah, no big deal….just shut up and pay it, right?
Sorry, Brad. Can’t go along with you on this one. Those of us who are business owners have a nightmare to negotiate. For example, this past year we were required to pay quarterly estimated taxes based on previous income. It wasn’t coming in this year, but we were still required to pay Uncle Sam as though it was. The solution for those of us who wish to avoid operating in the red is to raise the cost of services or take out loans to ride out the slump. (In effect, we’re allowing the government to use our money tax-free while we’re paying interest on loans to cover until we get it back after it’s been shown we’ve overpaid. Alternately, we can raise prices and let the consumer carry the burden and risk pricing ourselves out of the market.) Taxes are a big deal and when they adversely affect the ability for small enterprises to conduct business we all pay whether directly to the government or indirectly in the market place.
When McClatchy shutters the doors at The State, maybe you’ll take comfort in knowing that this is how they spent valuable resources in trying to comply with and avoid the tax code. See how many “grownups” can make heads or tails of this paragraph… and ask yourself whether a newspaper needs more tax accountants or more reporters.
From a recent McClatchy SEC filing:
Income Taxes:
The income tax rate from continuing operations in the third fiscal quarter of 2007 was impacted by two factors: Most of the goodwill impairment charges are not tax deductible and therefore provided a tax benefit of $23.7 million. In addition, tax for the current fiscal year includes a charge of $2.2 million related to certain tax positions taken by the Company for which it has established reserves. Excluding these issues, the underlying tax rate on continuing operations would have been 39.6%. The income tax rate in the third fiscal quarter of 2006 was 31.3% and was affected by the Company’s new operations added in the Acquisition which are in states with lower tax rates than its previous markets (prior to the Acquisition), lowering the Company’s effective state tax rate. The Company recalculated its 2006 deferred tax liabilities and assets at this new effective state tax rate, which resulted in a reduction to the third fiscal quarter of 2006 income tax provision of $5.9 million.
McCain’s proposal to reduce corporate income taxes to 25% would reduce their taxes by $5,000,000 from last year, and $6.3 million from their normal rate.
Bringing the rates in line with Europe (which liberals love to hold up as the model), would lower their tax to $10.6 million.
Personally, I think spreading that profit around to the shareholders or employees would be better than letting the government squander it, but that’s just me.
C’mon, Lee, that extra $5 million would probably only add about 75-100 new jobs. Why would McClatchy want to do that? Better to make profits via tax evasion.
Simplifying the tax code and reducing rates (as well as the size of government) would unleash an economic boom.
Wow, y’all certainly can be obtuse. Even Gordon, which surprises me.
The problem with these “Tax Day” releases and proclamations is that most of us DON’T own our own businesses, or newspaper corporations, or whatever. My experience is more typical than Gordon’s.
Also, the whole “Tax Day” rhetorical device is not a reference to the complexity of tax filing. It’s an attempt to tap into a childish resistance to the obligation to pay taxes, period.
And while I don’t know about all these other characters, I know Gordon is smart enough to see that. Come on, Gordon: Step back, take a deep breath and LOOK at the political phenomenon being described here. See what I mean now?
Oh, and Roy — if you were to look at my refund check, and then calculate the amount of time and effort it would take for me to take that same amount and lend it out to someone at interest, or invest it or whatever, I think you’d find that the profit wouldn’t amount to enough to be worth the time and thought that went into it.
At least, it wouldn’t be to me.
Anyway, rest assured that I’ve heard the “tax-free loan to the gummint” argument about a million times. And it leaves me unmoved.
But that’s pretty much the way I feel about money overall, which apparently separates me from the rest of y’all. I hate the stuff. I never have enough of it, and am forced to think about it FAR more than I want to. If I were independently wealthy, the very first thing I would do with my money is pay somebody whose entire job would be to make danged sure that I never, ever had to think about money — making it, paying it, losing it, whatever — ever again.
Nobody’s being obtuse here Brad but you.
You said that grownups pay their taxes without thinking about it. What you fail to grasp is that your view is not just in the minority opinion, it is just plain wrong. Most grownups think about whether they are getting value for the taxes they pay. Grownups think about how convoluted the system is. Grownups think about why the tax code is littered with special exemptions for people and corporations (like The State newspaper).
I would guess that the number of people who wish to pay zero taxes is about equal to the number of the people who share your love for paying them. Everybody else takes the mature view of thinking about how much they pay, how the taxes are spent, and why the rules are so complicated.
Brad, you just contradicted yourself. You say you hate money, yet in the very next set of statements you acknowledge just how very important it is. If it wasn’t important you wouldn’t have to devote so much effort to dealing with it. And besides, isn’t one part of the messing with money delimna figuring out all these darned tax issues. Conservatives and liberals alike at least agree on that much.
The Tax Code and regulations has grown from 10,000 pages when Clinton took office, to 30,000 when he left, to over 40,000 pages today, and many of those have been changed several times.
No one knows even part of the tax laws, which means there are thousands of contradictions, which means that what is enforced against one taxpayer varies wildly from what is enforced on another taxpayer by a different, ignorant IRS agent. And they are all ignorant, due to the volume of regulations they have never read.
A law professor explained it to me long ago:
“The tax code is not about raising money for vital services. Government has to find new ways to waste money in order to keep taxes high enough to control people, and prevent the average working man from becoming wealthy enough to have the leisure time to participate in governement.”
The number of people filing tax returns who pay no taxes is 49% of 106,000,000 people. Many actually receive refunds larger than all their payroll deductions.
That means that only 54,000,000 people paid all the taxes, out of 302,000,000 Americans.
Apologists for our corrupt tax system smear them as a “disguntled minority”.
No, bud, I didn’t (contradict myself).
To me, dealing with money in any way — paying taxes, writing a check, paying a bill, making an bank deposit, keeping change in my truck for parking meters — is onerous. I tend to appreciate the effortless transactions, and most ways of paying taxes (sales tax, the property tax that’s included with my mortgage payment, payroll deduction) fit roughly into that category. Parking meters do not.
It’s devoting thought and time to money that I resent. Yes, there’s filing to be done once a year on the income tax, but how is that any more onerous (when you add it up) than making monthly credit card payments or paying the electric bill 12 times a year?
For me, there’s nothing inherently more painful or irritating about paying taxes than filling out any other forms or dealing with money in any other way.
That’s because I lack the philosophical objection that some of y’all seem to have. I’d just as soon the money go to Uncle Sam as to the cable company. See, some of y’all think that the cable company is more responsive to your needs than Uncle Sam, but I won’t be convinced of that until they offer stations a la carte (I’m not holding my breath).
But what I truly want, really, is to never think about it or hear about it.
When have you ever had a philosophical objection to whatever the authorities handed down to you?
It sounds like the rest of us have a lot more experience with the tax system, a lot more knowledge, and have put a lot more thought into it.
A lot of people would rather have their money go up in smoke than the government to spend it on something more harmful than smoke.
Brad … it’s tough to chuckle at political fairy tales when the government has howitzer up your butt. I now work four months of the year to pay taxes, plus a fifth month to pay the lawers and accountans required to parse the process, at an average about $175 per hour. My final filing was 160 pages, mailed in seven separate envelopes, with an electronic file copy to get me in on time. Then I spent a whole day writing checks for current liabilities, and checks for estimated liabilities (to avoid penalties) … And I think to my self, self I think: This is why they had that tea party up in Boston.
Gimme a flat tax and a calculator, and I’ll put the entire tax-prep industry out of business in a year. What’s so hard about a flat tax???
Only 54 million people pay all taxes, Lee? What about payroll tax (you pay it if you’re employed or self-employed)? Sales tax (you pay it if you buy anything subject to the tax)? Gasoline tax (you pay it if you fill up a car)? Property tax (you pay it if you own a home or rent)? The usual Grover Norquist hogwash . . .
Steve,
Lee was specifically talking about Federal Income taxes.
Try again.
See, some of y’all think that the cable company is more responsive to your needs than Uncle Sam, but I won’t be convinced of that until they offer stations a la carte (I’m not holding my breath).
-Brad
If you don’t like something about the cable company you merely have the service stopped. I happen to find it highly offensive that my hard earned money is used to occupy a foreign nation who poses no harm to me. I have no choice but to pay my hard earned money to support this enterprise. Others on this blog have objections to other federal programs. We all devote large amounts of time and/or money to paying our taxes, much of which goes to pay for things we find offensive.
Why is this so difficult to understand? I’ll answer that for you. You simply do not find many government programs offensive, hence you feel your money is well spent. I don’t share that view. Most of my tax money is wasted. And that bothers me.
The FICA payroll taxes for Social Security are rebated to half the tax filers through the Earned Income Tax Credit, which was created by President Nixon for that purpose.
The subject is income taxes, but since Steve Gordy brings up the usual eyewash about other sales taxes, let me say that is good that “the poor” pay some taxes. Better that the only taxes were consumption taxes, applied evenly to everyone. It’s good for lower income people to have an stake in the system, instead of getting a free ride off that small Productive Minority who produce all the wealth for everyone.
Lee can you for once in your life support a claim with some kind of reference.
Two can play that game. Here’s my claim: 99% of all the benefits from the federal government are received by the richest 1% of Americans. Therefore these rich folks should pay 99% of the taxes. Since they pay less than 99% they are undertaxed.
Using the Lee rule for debate I don’t have to support this claim. I don’t have to offer any links, references or any supporting documents of any kind. I can just make an unsubstantiated claim and that somehow makes it true.
Sorry, Bud, but you are wrong. Here’s a link to a pie chart with the details based on Office of Management and Budget:
Where do tax dollars go?
A full 50% of federal taxes go to Medicare, Social Security, and Safety Net programs.
Interest on the debt and defense spending take up most of what remains.
Who pays taxes?
http://treas.gov/press/releases/reports/factsheetwhopaysmostindividualincometaxes.update.pdf
Top 5% pay 53.25% of all income taxes (Down from 2000 figure: 56.47%).
The top 10% pay 64.89% (Down from 2000 figure: 67.33%).
The top 25% pay 82.9% (Down from 2000 figure: 84.01%).
The top 50% pay 96.03% (Down from 2000 figure: 96.09%).
The bottom 50%? They pay a paltry 3.97% of all income taxes.
Sorry Doug, “all taxes” means “all taxes” in my lexicon. As for consumption-based taxes, go over to the Atlanta Journal Constitution and look at their blog on the “Fair Tax.” It’s anything but simple. Lee, you make a valid point about consumption taxes – provided ALL consumption (including professional fees, haircuts, and everything in between) were subject to taxation. Got any idea how complicated that could be to apply or enforce?
A “sales tax” on professional services would actually be an income tax on the gross revenues of professionals. It won’t work, although nitwits like Cindi Scoppe are infatuated with it.
1. Professionals will vote with their feet.
Attempts by the State of SC to double tax incomes of construction workers and engineers who work outstide SC has cost the state 100,000 high-income workers who moved.
Stupid greed costs the state at least $10 BILLION annually in personal incomes, not to mention all the other business.
2. A typical corporation only earns 5-8% net profit, whether it sells goods or services. If you tack on a 6% revenue tax, that wipes out their profits. They have to raise prices by at least 10% to cover the overhead. In a local market, that’s bad enough. But if they are competing across state lines or with countries who don’t have such a stupid tax, they will be out of business. Then the stupid state gets zero revenue.
Why am I not surprised that the person who professes to like money the least seems to like taxes the most?
Steve,
Here’s what Lee wrote:
“The number of people filing tax returns who pay no taxes is 49% of 106,000,000 people. Many actually receive refunds larger than all their payroll deductions.
That means that only 54,000,000 people paid all the taxes, out of 302,000,000 Americans.”
The part about ALL TAXES applies to the prior two sentences which is talking specifically about Federal Income Taxes.
I think it’s pretty clear what he was talking about.
As far as what Lee clearly meant, what is the source on his “100,000 high-income workers who moved.” Where were they? When did they move? What is the source of this claim? As to Lee’s attempted refutation, he was attacking a position I haven’t taken; the tax on professional services is pretty well required for the “Fair Tax” to work at anything less than about a 30-35% tax level.
Sheesh, you guys sure get worked up about money. You might check this out— It really isn’t a very good use of time to worry about how to hoard something you are not going to keep. “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep, in order to gain what he cannot lose.” Jim Eliot, missionary martyr to Ecuador
The tax lovers are those who don’t pay much taxes. They never owned a business, never created jobs, have no comprehension of how taxes destroy the ladder of success for the poor who actually want to work, and don’t care.
Replacing the income tax with a national sales tax only requires a 14% tax on retail sales. That is too much, because government is about 4 times the size it needs to be. After you get rid of garbage like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, grants for bogus research, and interest on the national debt, it only takes about a 4% sales tax to operate the federal government – as it did for 150 years off just a few excise taxes and import duties.
As recall, Herb, you are a member of the clergy, whose silence was bought with an exemption from paying FICA taxes.
My Lee, how you do manipulate. “Silence bought . . .” Well, no, the reason being, according to IRS publication 517:
“You are conscientiously opposed to public insurance because of your individual religious considerations (not because of your general conscience), or you are opposed because of the principles of your religious denomination.”
Well, I was not conscientiously opposed, so I’ve been paying Social Security taxes all my life.
Your attack on ministers who do choose the exemption, insinuating that they are unprincipled hypocrites that can be “bought” is uncalled for, but typical stereotyping on your part, I’m afraid.
Brad, don’t you think this has gone on long enough? This isn’t true of me, or of a lot of people I know. What is true is that a lot of us get tired of being told that we “don’t care” because we don’t agree with Lee.
As long as Lee posts this kind of trash, your claim to having a fair blog rings hollow.
Depends on what you mean by “fair.” Remember that I give a lot of leeway (no pun intended) to people who use their full names.
Once, I kicked Lee off the blog. He stayed away awhile, then came back using his full name. So that gives him a lot of license. Doesn’t meant I can’t kick him off again, it just means I let him go further first…
Thank you for giving me license to tell the truth.
Herb already admitted before that the clergy was until recently, exempt from paying Social Security taxes, and paid into private savings accounts, just like the ones proposed today to reform Social Security.
Until recently, the clergy, public school teachers, federal employees and many others were exempt from paying Social Security taxes. That’s a fact. Some still are. Teachers in Texas elected to not participate, and many of the older ones have never paid one cent of FICA taxes. Good for them.
Thanks, Herb, for admitting that the clergy can CHOOSE to not pay FICA taxes, and put the money into real retirement accounts.
Why do you think the politicians exempted clergy and school teachers? Could it possibly be so they wouldn’t suffer the same robbery as their congregations and students, so they wouldn’t become a social force for reform? I think so. It seems to have worked well, too.
Every fact and figure I posted about “the rich” paying the vast majority of taxes came from the Treasury Department, which is why you attack me personally rather than try to dispute the facts.
Lee, you can stop putting your spin on what I write, and twisting it around to your own purposes. Just stop.
Clergy who have religious convictions opposed to insurance have been allowed to opt out. Read the publication. Stop twisting my words.
I did not opt out, nor have many other clergy.
Are you saying that the clergy who did that have no religious convictions? That’s quite an insult. I do think the rest of Americans should be extended the same choice to opt out of this tax.
You should have opted out of the bankrupt welfare program misnamed, “Social Security”, and invested your money in a real retirement plan. The Supreme Court ruled that it is not insurance, not a retirement plan, not an annuity – just welfare
No, what I said was that you can stop twisting my words around, but evidently you don’t understand what that means.
Well, honest, well-meaning people will be able to interpret what I say correctly. The rest, like yourself, will attempt to degrade and attack others at every opportunity. It is tiresome, wearying, and pointless to argue with people like that. Hopefully I will learn my own lesson and cease trying.
Yet another post where Herb rants about other posters, while avoiding a straight answer or exposition of why all Americans shouldn’t be allowed the same privilege he has to CHOOSE whether to throw 15.3% of their gross pay away on that welfare program called Social Security.
Yet another post in which Lee twists my words in order to push his own ideology. But for the sake of someone else who might still be reading this: My convictions are that no one should be exempt of paying Social Security taxes, and I back that up by paying them myself. I do not believe it is a good idea to wipe out the system and make it a free-for-all, as Lee desires, but I have no real fear that that will ever happen, so that scenario is irrelevant. But if you want some of the historical development for this exemption with regard to clergy, see the following exchange, but be sure to read all of it, including this and the following parts:
Since I don’t make the laws, I can’t stop clergy from having this option, but I do not support it. However, we do have a history in this country for being lenient upon the personal, religious convictions of people. I suppose that Lee is indicating that this leniency should cease, and I suppose that it will. Whether we will be the better for it, is another question.
I am involved in mission organizations who likewise do not support the option for clergy. We ask missionaries, who are almost always ordained, commissioned clergy, to pay into the Social Security system, and not to opt out.
Why would anyone in their right mind throw money away on a bankrupt Ponzi welfare scheme?
It is personally and socially irresponsible.
You could do more good by investing that money in your own plan. Your retirement would be secure, and you would still have more money to donate to charity than what the government dribbles out of Social Insecurity.