War.mongeR1

Well, it's that time of the season again and due to our genius congress, the tax code for 2007 is more complex than ever.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24112908

This article explains how the time it takes to prepare taxes increased this year, due to the increasing complexity and how the IRS can't even keep up to give us a simplified form. I don't know if you folks who get nice and easy W-2's can understand my frustration, but I'm self-employed, had like 12 different companies I worked for last year, a divorce, and the most complex taxes I've ever had to deal with. It was so bad, I decided to use a CPA an associate recommended to me. Needless to say, I'm filing an extension because my head is stills spinning. Any other small business owners here as frustrated as I am?

So for this upcoming Presidential/Congressional election, taxes are a BIG deal to me. That's the issue that hits many of us the most personally. I'd blame the spendocrats, but the Republicans in congress haven't been much better, even though they "act" like they're a lot better. I wonder if things will get better or worse under the next presidency. BTW, the previous Bush tax cuts helped me tremendously. I gotta hand it to the president for that one. It's not only for the wealthy, despite what opposing politicians would have us believe. I personally benefited greatly from them and it truly scares me to hear our politicians and presidential hopefuls talking about getting rid of the Bush tax cuts.

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"Common sense is not so common." -Voltaire

Hambergler

This could have been a nice discussion about 2007 taxes, but nooooooooo the Iraq war has to be paid for. Say hello to irresponsible war mongering.

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El_Gringo_Grande

Computers fix all that.

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Sen. John McCain (AZ) For President '08
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I’m not racists, I have republican friends. Radio show host.
- "The essence of tyranny is the denial of complexity". -Jacob Burkhardt
- "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds" - Emerson
- "People should not be afraid of it's government, government should be afraid of it's People." - Line from V for Vendetta
- If software were as unreliable as economic theory, there wouldn't be a plane made of anything other than paper that could get off the ground. Jim Fawcette

War.mongeR1

While that is true for many people, I learned the hard way last year that Turbotax and other programs are not nearly aggressive enough with helping to maximize legitimate deductions. Thus, I got blasted pretty bad last year and ended up owing a good amount. Shoulda used a CPA or done 'em by hand. And I refuse to use H&R Block and other normal tax services, seeing as they completely blow and in my experience, Turbotax is far superior than using the temps they use who know nothing of in depth tax code.

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"Common sense is not so common." -Voltaire

Steeler

Could be worse <points to location in nametag>. Seriously, even when I'm doing contract work I've never had a problem with the Fed, but Mass tax forms are the worst. 30+ hours just to figure out that they owe me $23. Argh!

Still, I think most of my productivity loss for 2007 went to Sins of a Solar Empire, not tax preparation.

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War.mongeR1

Haha. Good point. Thank god I'm not in Mass. I couldn't imagine filing state taxes on top of fed taxes. Sheesh, what a pain. Do they have CPA's for the state too?

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"Common sense is not so common." -Voltaire

Gambit7

If we eliminated deductions altogether and had a truly progressive tax structure you wouldnt even NEED to file taxes in the first place. The whole system is stupid IMO.

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War.mongeR1

Yup. Pretty dumb and unnecessarily complex.

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"Common sense is not so common." -Voltaire

Steeler

As someone pointed out in another thread, eliminating deductions would make it very hard to run a small business. It would also remove the public's ability to leverage soft economic power through tax incentives.

You may prefer that, but it's important to recognize that that's what you're proposing.

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Pittbullbloodr

You guys heard of THE FAIR TAX???
Great idea, set 23% tax on all new idems with no inbeded tax like we have now.
What it means is as the idem is being made there are no taxes added in.
When the idem is made then sold at that point 23% tax is added on.
Keep in mind the cost to build will be lower due to no tax add in.(approx 22% of idem now)
as built but put back in at the 23%.
So we get rid of the FEDERAL income tax all together ,and just pay an extra 1% at time of sell compared to now.

ScratchMonkey

Just go to 100% withholding and let the State send you back what it thinks you deserve. Lets them do all the paperwork. This should be a perfect system for those of you who think taxation is a moral way of paying for services, and who think the State can be trusted with running the economy.

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Sig

leejo

The State could just take over ADP and deduct the appropriate amount from each check, then deposit it into our accounts. Think of all the efficiencies we'd gain by using a single-payer system. If they did the same thing for banks we could streamline things even more.

Skylark

I am in favor of a flat tax. Maybe not the exact same percentage for everyone, but a flat rate without changes for everyone. The basic result would be to look at the chart. Look up how much you made. Send in that much. That would be all.

No deductions. No credits.

This would accomplish several things
a) H&R Block would die. MWA HA HA HA No wait.. this is why it wouldn't happen. Every tax service would fight it because they would go out of business.
b) Taxes would be done quickly and easily.
c) The IRS would be seriously downsized. Smaller government because it would be easier to do. Did they pay? yup. No detailed math/analysis and arguements over whether that qualified or not.
d) How much would be saved on time, printing, etc..
e) There wouldn't be all the crazy arguements over whether someone was paying their share. But Bill Gates figured out how to only pay $4.38 in tax this year! DARN HIM!
f) The government would also save money by not having to mail us stuff telling us that we might be getting a check.
I do support a flat tax (everyone pays the same percent, including the rich) but that doesn't seem to be in favor in a lot of areas. Many people think that the rich should pay a much larger percentage than the poor 'because they can.' (yeah, I know there are supposed other reasons, but I think that is the real one.)

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"I've TKed better men then you, and I wasn't even trying!"


Skylark |TG PCS|

Kerostasis

I'm not entirely sure how self-consistent my view on taxes is, lets see if I can clarify it by thinking out loud:

--When taxes are onerous and heavy, I'm willing to accept placing a proportionately higher burden on the rich, because placing the onerous and heavy tax burden evenly on the poor would crush them, while the rich can at least survive.
--However, the end goal should be reducing the tax burden so it is not so onerous and heavy, rather than simply finding the best way to distribute the burden. Then as the burden becomes lighter and less onerous, the rich should be the first to enjoy the rewards of the lesser burden since they were shouldering the bulk of the higher burden before.
--The lower the overall tax rate is, the less I support progressivism in tax rates and the more I support flat taxes. Our current overall tax burden is still too high for me to be comfortable with a flat tax.

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ScratchMonkey

Recall that taxes serve two very different purposes:

Funding community projects (military and social).

Punishing people you don't like (the rich, smokers, gasoline users).

I could live with the first objective, but I think it's better served with fees, which at least provide more direct feedback from consumer (taxpayer) to producer (government) which tends to improve resource allocation.

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Sig