What’s not to like about a flat tax?

Everyone knows the IRC is a mess and that virtually no one understands it and that in many ways it simply is not fair. In addition, some provisions from dealing with health benefits to retirement work against individuals while other elements of the Code inhibit economic growth. So, why not fix it, simplify it? How hard can that be? Well, for one thing consider the millions of Americans who make a living off the current complexities from IRS employees; accountants, lawyers, software developers, tax preparers and most of all … politicians and those who lobby them.

There are powerful forces that like things as complicated as possible thank you very much, forces especially in Washington, DC, whose concern for the American people is far down the list below their own interests.

There is no logical reason not to have a greatly simplified tax code, none.

The Rand Paul plan is a place to start, but sadly we will likely focus on issues such as the paragraph below. Others will start yelling about cutting this or that program or some individuals not paying their fair share because the tax rate is not 90% on millionaires. That is all a ruse to maintain the status quo. Any politician who opposes greatly simplifying the IRC or who dwells on entitlement programs is working against you. You are being used and abused. 

Mr. Paul said his plan, laid out on The Wall Street Journal’s opin­ion pages, would reduce the gov­ern­ment’s tax take by over $2 tril­lion over 10 years, or at least 5%, based on con­gres­sional rev­enue es­timates for 2016 to 2025. It would re­quire sub­stan­tial spend­ing cuts to avoid adding to deficits—an amount roughly equal to all deficit reduc­tion the fed­eral gov­ern­ment has done since 2010. -WSJ

Who knows if 14.5% is the right number? Perhaps we need a small VAT in addition, maybe the right number is 16.5%. That’s not important now. What is important is getting started and doing something that is headed in the right direction.

There are six things to focus on:

1. The system is fair
2. The system is simple
3. The system preserves the social programs Americans want and are willing to pay for
4. The system stimulates economic growth
5. The system places the United States is a favorable global economic position
6. The system gradually reduces the deficit and sustains a balance

All this is good, but nothing is going to happen, nothing unless the American people put pressure on all politicians and now is the time to start by putting pressure on each candidate for president. 

You have two challenges; lobby for a simple, fair tax code and for term limits. 

In the final analysis, it is up to you and it’s not all that complicated. Share this post with your friends, heck share it with your elected representatives— Do something, please‼️

Highlights of the Rand Paul plan (at least a place to start):

The plan would elim­i­nate pay­roll taxes on work­ers, as well as gift and es­tate taxes and all du­ties and tar­iffs. His flat tax would ap­ply to all personal income, in­clud­ing wages, salaries, div­i­dends, capi­tal gains, rents and interest. It would ex­empt the first $50,000 of in­come for a fam­ily of four.

The plan would elim­i­nate many de­duc­tions but pre­serve two widely used ones, for mortgage in­ter­est and char­i­ta­ble con­tri­bu­tions. One of the few tar­geted tax breaks it would re­tain is the earned-in­come tax credit, a wage sup­ple­ment for lower-in­come work­ing fami­lies.