fairtax

[keith27m1985]

what do you think about fairtax?

[CHANEYLAKEGIRL]

Fairtax is a tax concept based on consumption (a sales tax) vs income tax. It is an interesting proposal, I think it would hurt middle income earners more than the current system and actually favor higher income earners, who need to spend less of their income as a percentage on needs than middle income earners.

Since I am trying to grow as much of my own food as possible and cut back on purchases and increasing savings, I think we (my family) would actually pay less taxes with the fair tax than we currently do with the income tax system.

[inertia4]

I think they should have revamped the tax structure in this country years ago. I believe that a flat tax would be better for a few reasons. One being everyone would be paying their fair share and second would be that it would eliminate all the loopholes in the tax system. Right now there is way too many loopholes where they can screw the system with.

[ktheodos]

I think they should have revamped the tax structure in this country years ago. I believe that a flat tax would be better for a few reasons. One being everyone would be paying their fair share and second would be that it would eliminate all the loopholes in the tax system. Right now there is way too many loopholes where they can screw the system with.

I agree - too many loopholes - a flat tax would be fair, but even just a simple, slightly progressive one would be okay.....if you tax lower incomes too much, they can't build/save up income for the future...higher incomes can afford to pay a little more but shouldn't get unfairly punished so they can put some of that $ back into the economy

[kaitsilva]

I agree that we need a totally new tax system, but fairtax isn't it. As someone already pointed out, it favors the rich.

What's sad is that both parties are still waiting for the Reaganomics "trickle down" tax method to work because they themselves are better off than most Americans and have rich lobbyist buddies they want to appease. Therefore the rich keep all their extra tax breaks for themselves and the rest of us get screwed. How they don't realize this is beyond me! 

[narv]

The interesting thing about the fairtax idea (or any sales tax) is that it is completely avoidable. If someone was to live completely off of their own land, and grow their own food and everything, then they would never have to pay sales tax unless they decided to buy something they could not produce (like maybe an iPad, but it turns out you can live without those).

So the idea of "everyone would pay their fair share" is completely false.  But it is an appealing idea, nonetheless.

[handllucas]

I think taxes should be based on consumption.
The current system allows greater deductions for the more dependents you have.
So if you keep having kids, the LESS you pay.
Seems kind of backwards to me.

[hawkeye3210]

I think they should have revamped the tax structure in this country years ago. I believe that a flat tax would be better for a few reasons. One being everyone would be paying their fair share and second would be that it would eliminate all the loopholes in the tax system. Right now there is way too many loopholes where they can screw the system with.

Tax loopholes exist more in myth than they do in actuality. If an actual loophole was found, congress would be pretty quick to close it going forward. Too many people mistake proper tax planning with exploiting so-called tax loopholes.