Tag: tax policy

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Common Sense national politics & policies tax policy too much government

Poor, Poor IRS

Squeezing the Taxpayer

As Tax Day approaches, you can bet the Internal Revenue Service has readied itself to help taxpayers file their returns.

No?

“It’s abysmal,” admits IRS Commissioner John Koskinen, discussing his agency’s help for Americans trying to decipher a byzantine, ever-changing tax code.

It seems only four of ten citizens ever succeed in getting through to the IRS on the phone, even after waiting multiple hours. Over days. There have been over 5 million “courtesy disconnects” — that’s IRS lingo for its phone system hanging up on you.

To boot, once you get to a real person, that employee can’t tell you much.

The problem? According to the Washington Post, the poor agency lacks the necessary funds because “Republicans on Capitol Hill have slashed the IRS budget.”

Actually, the IRS budget has gone up every year . . . in nominal dollars. When adjusted for inflation? Well, there has been some decline.

Bemoaning this supposed “era of shrinking government,” the Post assails conservatives in Congress, citing the “cuts” as “punishment for a string of missteps: an extravagant conference for employees in Anaheim, Calif., the targeting of conservative groups seeking tax exemptions, $1 million in bonuses given to agency employees who didn’t pay their federal taxes.”

Punishment seems in order.

But another story puts in perspective this crocodile cry for more money. The Daily Caller recently reported: “The Obama administration has quietly killed an IRS tax preparation program designed to help low-income and disadvantaged citizens, choosing instead to give millions of dollars to liberal groups for the same purpose.”

Look on the bright side, a review of these help-groups found their advice to have a mere 49 percent error rate.

This is Common sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Squeezing the Taxpayer

 

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video

Video: Jon Lovitz Clarifies

A few months ago, Jon Lovitz caught Hollywood’s elites off-guard by turning on President Barack Obama on the tax issue. He ranted against the notion that he and others like him don’t pay their “fair share” of taxes. He used, shall we say, “harsh words.” Now, calmed down a bit, and in a different venue, he clarifies:

A section of his original rant, here (contains profanity).

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free trade & free markets ideological culture tax policy

Unfuzzying Up the Past

We hear a lot of talk about the disappearing middle class. Sometimes this jabber goes so far as to posit that normal folks — say, the “99 percent” — haven’t really experienced any progress since the ’60 or ’70s.

So blame the rich. And their government.

It’s not an implausible case. Wealthy interests do rent politicians at extravagant rates, changing policy in their favor.

But as economist Russ Roberts and Cornell University’s Richard Burkhauser discussed recently, sloppy statistics feed the hand-wringing over middle-class decline. Considering government transfer payments from rich to poor and plotting income by household rather than individually, the basic “stagnation” thesis doesn’t pass the “smell test.”

For the real stink, however, consult the Internet memes, particularly this goofy contention:

In the 1950s and 1960s when the top tax rate was 70-92%, we laid the interstate system, built the Internet, put a man on the moon, defeated Communism, our education system was the envy of the world, our middle class thriving, our economy unparalleled. You want that back? Raise taxes on the rich.

Forget the obvious nonsense (ARPANET was the Internet only in ovo; Communism collapsed in the ’80s), and concentrate on the main points, as Tom Woods has done: tax evasion was rampant back in the alleged “good ol’ days”; public schools have doubled in per capita spending since then, and not improved; and the stagflationary ’70s followed the booming ’60s, almost certainly as a consequence of the policies being touted, here.

Selective memories help in constructing just-so policy “proofs.” The middle class has received some big hits, I grant you. Still, we’ve seen progress, too.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

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tax policy

Philly Bloggers Beware

Do you live in Philadelphia? Do you blog? Have you earned a penny or more from your blog page? Then don’t click away!

Stick around a minute even if you blog in some other town, because today’s installment is about the lengths to which tax mongers might go to mulct or muzzle you.

The Philadelphia government has begun sending letters demanding dough to bloggers who report even trivial revenue from their blogs. The city wants $300 for “business privilege” licenses. Marilyn Bess is one recipient. Her blog MsPhilly Organic earned about $50 over the last few years.

Sean Barry also got the city’s letter. His own blog, Circle of Fits, has been deluged with some $11 in revenue over the last couple of years. He, too, had dutifully reported the blog-generated boodle on his tax returns.

What did these electron-stained opinion-purveyors do to deserve this special attention? Nothing but fail to read every last jot of the city’s tax code — and every last secret inter-department city government memo about when to go after local bloggers — before setting fingers to keys.

Philadelphia’s pursuit of imaginary scofflaws may amount to just an obtuse lunge for hitherto unextracted funds. But the new protocol is also a weapon that could be selectively deployed, now or later, to harass bloggers who publish inconvenient words. Wouldn’t be the first time in our history that the power to tax has been turned to such ends.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.