"Eliminate the Loopholes!"

I often recommend that everyone in the world read Barlett & Steele's "America: Who Really Pays the Taxes?"  You may be interested to know that the book is not anti-income tax - it is a non-partisan, very enlightening look at our current tax system.

It is a testament to the power of habit that even the authors, esteemed investigative journalists who grew up under this system and have known nothing else, missed a critical piece to the problems that plague the income tax.  The information contained in this important book helped me understand that it is a very naive position to talk of eliminating the loopholes in the income tax, the loopholes that allow the wealthiest Americans to avoid the tax altogether.  It is naive when you understand that the income tax system is ITSELF the loophole.

Read the book.

What We Need Around Here Is An Income Tax!

Check out this recent story on income inequality.  It's worth noting that a drastic rise in income inequality through America's Gilded Age is what stoked the push for the income tax over a hundred years ago.  This incredible plan to redistribute wealth was set up to affect only the richest 1% of the population - only they were to pay an income tax when it first went into effect in 1913, certainly not the average working man or woman.

The people who actually put this plan in place were the richest 1% (red flag?).  The people who believed that this plan would be some sort of equalizer were the 99% (surprise!).  Time for our hundred-year reality check:

In 2011 (I don't yet have numbers for 2012), over 100,000 of the wealthiest Americans dutifully filed their tax returns and paid zero income tax.

In 2012, I earned income at well below the poverty line.  I filed my return and had to pay over $400 in income tax or face fines, confiscation of property or rights to property, or imprisonment.

Equalizer my ass.