My idea to fix the country

[Shooter04]

I know it's not very original, but here was something I thought up a couple weeks ago while talking with my father. On paper it looks like it'd work. On the other hand.....communism looks good on paper too....





Basically, this would be a large scale tax reform; re-writing the whole system in an effort to simplify it and stream line it. There would only be two taxes imposed on US citizens.

For the national government, a national income tax fixed at 15% of your total income for a year. This would go to national programs such as defense, social security, medicare, medicaid, education, etc.

With the national average of an American age 18 and older being about $28,000 (2006 average, most recent I could find), and there being 310 million Americans (according to census bureau), that'd be 1.26 trillion dollars going into the US government each year. I know these figures aren't accurate, some people make more and some less, this was only using the average. But you see where I'm going with this.

By cutting government spending, and I mean CUTTING, not just pussyfooting around, most importantly the homeland security/defense budget, the debt could be under control and paid off in under 20 years. (calculated with my 12 digit desktop calculator )

For state governments, a state sales tax set at whatever the state chooses. This would go towards paying state wide services.

With this reform would come regulations on government spending. Biggest and most important being the government may not spend more than it will take in in one year. If Uncle Sam takes in $1.26 trillion in a year, then it may only spend $1.26 that year. And so on and so on. In other words, a $0 deficit. I don't see why this isn't a law already......





Thoughts?

[FordGuy100]

I think we should go back to when the national income tax was first implimented. Thats the best rate.

I also like the idea of a flat tax as well. State sales, and state income taxes suck though, hate em both. Sales tax effects me more than Oregons state income tax did (paid $150 on the roughly $5500 I earned each summer for Oregon's state income tax, versus the sales tax in Texas that has probably increased that figure 5 fold).

[FordGuy100]

And remember when you are caluculating the national debt you have to factor in interest. Interest on all those trillions of dollars is pretty big.....

[Shooter04]

Yah my calculations weren't in depth enough to factor interest

My main complaint is why Uncle Sam seems to spend more than he takes in. If the rest of us were to do that, we'd all be homeless in a year . I just don't get it

I really think a flat income tax across the board would do wonders for the country as a whole. I don't think 15% is asking too much. In Switzerland, the national income tax is 60%

[choctaw]

After Steve Forbes explanation of the Flat Tax, I'm not too sure I am still in favor. I'm a plumber, so please don't ask me to repeat it. i do recall that it would cause the cost of everything to go up, more than is advertised.

[icysmooth]

Well,you do have a good idea and many will agree along with myself,but the main problem is Congress doesn't act like a responsible household does

We - meaning us workers,will only spend what we have and sometimes use the ol' credit card,but that has to be paid back-or your credit is screwed

The gov't on the other hand-thinks they have a credit card with no limit-it's obvious how they have shown that and ain't even close to being done on how far they can run that up-that's why China owns us

Saying cutting spending-I say

But these morons can't put out the fire the money they have that burns the hole in our pockets.

Their logic-spend,spend,spend,spend-there's no end to stupidity from them-but it's not their money-it's ours!

Remember-liberals are only generous with other people's money

But they don't care about us,they care about them-that's the whole problem in DC corruption-it's all about their own pocket money-so a flat tax would never pass due to greed

Democrats are not what they used to be-ie:-for the working man/woman,it's all about cashing in now a days.

How do we clean Washington of the corruption and the screwing of us?

I don't know these days anymore

It seems as though we're just told to shut the hell up and be happy------
Kind of seems a little COMMI-doesn't it?

[Shooter04]

So....who exactly are we in debt to? Like when the news says we're in debt X amount of dollars....to who? Or what?

[Dave]

Most of our debt is owned by the American people and american companies in the form of savings bonds t bills and stuff like that.

other debt is foreign debt. China is the largest foreign debt holder followed by japan

[Dave]

Most of our debt is owned by the American people and american companies in the form of savings bonds t bills and stuff like that.

other debt is foreign debt. China is the largest foreign debt holder followed by japan.


The reason China is able to do what they can is they are currently in the state the US was before the liberals took hold of government

[Zytek_Fan]

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