When he’s not sharing his thoughts about Barack Obama’s birth certificate, Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry is apparently unveiling a tax plan. It’s a flat tax, with a few other details explained by the Washington Post (10/26/11):
Perry also would reduce the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 20 percent; eliminate taxes on dividends and capital gains; make deep, unspecified cuts in federal spending; and establish individual retirement accounts outside the Social Security system.
The article, by Karen Tumulty, gets approving quotes from a Republican adviser and anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist. But it also says this, in the reporter’s own voice:
The proposal would be a boon to the wealthiest Americans, and that is one reason why previous flat-tax proposals, though appealing in their simplicity, have never gone far politically.
Indeed. If there’s one thing that doesn’t go far politically, it’s tax policy that favors the wealthy.
Time to support the country, not the country club!
It’s astounding to see Rick Perry make George W. Bush look intelligent.
Talk about Dumb and Dumber.
Seriously, has there EVER been a tax policy that does NOT favor the wealthy?
C’mon, willya.
A tax plan of, by, and for the 1%.
There’s the often repeated idea that America has one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world and perhaps that’s true on paper. Those who say this conveniently ignore that other OECD countries have closed all those corporate tax loopholes while the U.S. has expanded them. When we factor in the tax breaks, subsidies, and other loopholes, the U.S. corporate tax rate is one of the lowest (I believe it’s second from the bottom)in the industrial world. This is according to the Center for Tax Justice which crunched the numbers from the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development), the Office of Management and Budget, and the Census Bureau.
the wapo headline, “GOP tax plans on divergent paths,” was also pretty misleading considering every tax plan described did the same thing…reduce taxes on the rich
All tax plans should be judged first and foremost on how much money will go into the coffers.If some form of flat tax ,or consumption tax would increase revenue than it must be considered.The idea of whether or not a tax is fair….is completely speculative.The great thing about the 999 plan and Perrys, is it finally offers a revamping instead of a tweaking.Sooner or later this is the road we must travel
Flat taxes are regressive, shifting the burden to the middle class as usual.
By all means, let’s have Wall St. take the Social Security payroll tax. They need a new source of fees and money. An entrance fee? An administrative fee? A withdrawal fee? Will they go up and up again? The possibilities are endless. This way we can pay all kinds of fees to Wall St., and hope it doesn’t crash again. With no pensions, ridiculously low sums of interest paid by banks on deposits, and fees for Wall St., we’ll all work till we die.
Of course, no taxes on dividends and capital gains, one of the primary sources of income for the rich.
Fairness is not completely speculative. Does a tax place more burden on those with more ability to pay or does it hurt people who have less ability more? Does it charge people in closer proportion to the benefits they receive from government? Does a tax leave people with more income better off than people with less income? These are some of the generally-accepted definitions of fairness in tax codes. The 9/9/9 plan does none of these and generates significantly LESS revenue than the current system. A graduated progressive income tax meets all of the criteria above and the main problem with ours is that it is not progressvie enough. The top rates are artificially low by historical and redistributive standards, and we could use several more brackets near the top. We should also stop treating speculative financial manipulations preferentially, but should tax them at a HIGHER rate to discourage them, while exempting productive investments (and eventually taxing them at a lower rate once we have restored our industrial base).
The change we need in the tax system is to remove the necessity for lawyers and accountants and remove all the specials laws and cases, and then:
1) no tax for people under 35K
2) make labor and investment taxes the same.
3) progressive taxes with rates increasing to establish a virtual maximum wage somewhere not under 7.5 million, but not much more. That is have the rate of tax on extremely high income that makes extremely high salaries not worth it to the companies.
4) have regular, geometric or exponenential brackets that increase regularly and fairly to the highest level.
5) Lower Social Security taxes on everyone by making it payable on all income at a very much lower rate. We have more older people that need to retire in order to give younger people jobs, so boost up social security, not ruin it.
It is not hard.
Brux(max wage?)… what would Brad Pitt pay on his taxes, if he made 30 mill on his next picture?
No tax for those under 35K???What percentage are you comfortable with paying -nothing?
Lower SS taxes?Older people that need retire?
What party speaks for you sir?
the tax policy center took a look at perry’s plan and found it would reduce revenues over current projections, if the bush tax cuts expire, $995 billion by 2015…..
HOORAY FOR BRUX… boo to michael e!!! and what party do you subscribe to, sir??? Those in the 35K bracket and below cannot even afford medications and other needed resources, let alone comforts that so many others enjoy. They must jostle between feeding their families and paying their bills… we ALL pay taxes… on EVERYTHING (practically)… eliminating or minimizing income tax on certain SES groups won’t prevent our government from getting money elsewhere…
CCD can I blow up your words”WE ALL PAY TAXES>>>>ON EVERYTHING(PRACTICALLY) and hang it from the white house dome?I could not of said it better.
Woodward B…can you expound on that please.
Woodward
Please watch DicK Morris lunch alert where he explains how much better 999 is, over Perry’s 20% flat tax.
re: 999
better at what? giving more tax breaks to the top? increasing tax rates on the bottom 84% ?
increasing the deficit some more?
admittedly it’s simpler…but it’s still a disaster
re: perry’s plan and that $995 billion in revenue reductions [assuming this is what you’d like me to expound upon]
http://taxpolicycenter.org/taxtopics/Perry-plan.cfm