4 ms·

Or at the very least our entire national tax code should be downloadable in machine-readable form.

by natechols 8y ago

analog31 8y ago
It should just be a giant function: def foo(**kwargs): <insert code here> return how_much_you_owe
- m0zg 8y ago
  It really should be a provably unambiguous ruleset that would take in the person's circumstances and numbers and spit out a number, yes. I understand that your post is a joke, but that'd be an _awesome_ thing to have for everyone, especially if coupled with some adversarial tech to find and close loopholes. Which is, ironically, why this isn't going to happen.
  - natechols 8y ago
    I've always assumed that Intuit lobbying alone will be sufficient to kill this idea.
    - m0zg 8y ago
      I think Intuit is just a scapegoat in this case. Incomprehensible tax code is a rich environment for corruption.
      - natechols 8y ago
        Totally true, but I've certainly seen claims that Intuit actually lobbies against simplifying the tax code.
  - logfromblammo 8y ago
    This might work: x = gross_income / median_income; if( x <= 1 ) { return 0; } if( x <= 50 ) { y = ( x * Math.ln( x ) - x + 1 ) / Math.ln( 2500 ); } else { y = x - 0.5 * Math.ln( 50 ) * Math.li( x ) + 4.862; } return y * median_income; Math.ln() is the log function for base e, and Math.li() is the logarithmic integral function. The constants are based on the income at 50 times the median income having a marginal tax rate of 50%, and the median income having a marginal tax rate of 0%. Marginal tax rates above 50% asymptotically approach 100%. There are no loopholes or exemptions. If the median income is $32k, and you earned $31k, your tax is zero. Your only obligation is to report your gross income honestly, so that the median income is calculated accurately for next year. If your income is $96k, your x = 3.0, your y = 0.1656, so your tax is $15.9k . If your income is $1.6M, your x = 50, your y = 18.74, so your tax is $600k . If your income is $32M, your x = 1000, your y = 657.5, and your tax = $21M. The only effective ways to reduce your tax would be to reduce your income (as reported) or raise the nationwide median income, such as by paying your lowest-paid workers more in the previous year. Seems fair to me.
    - m0zg 8y ago
      There's one fly in this socialist ointment: all the rich people will immediately bail, and go live elsewhere.
      - c22 8y ago
        It shouldn't matter where they live if they're still making their money here. And if they're not making any money then they're not paying taxes under this scheme anyway.
      - logfromblammo 8y ago
        Ah. Well, that's fine. They can go somewhere else and renounce citizenship, then huff and puff when they start having difficulties getting the money out of the businesses and property they left behind, and getting the knobbly, nail-studded end of the mercantilists' stick. Your argument rests on the presumption that the economy needs super-rich people to be performant, when corporations and governments have already solved the problem of collaborative concentration of capital. If they leave, and the economy somehow fails to collapse, they have shown the lie behind rich folks as "job creators". Economies are run by the people who do the work. Sitting on ass and writing checks serves to weed out some of the worst ideas, and shuffling financial instruments serves to lubricate the gears of the economic machine, but should the rich ever go on strike, they will immediately lose all their leverage as the economy restructures itself to work without them. At worst, they can just get replaced by newly-minted rich people.
        m0zg 8y ago
        That's how you get Venezuela though. Good luck with that.
        logfromblammo 8y ago
        You get Venezuela with bad government. And they bought theirs with state-owned (nationalized in 1976) petroleum money, not with progressive income taxes. Progressive taxation is how you get Europe. Occasionally, someone like Gerard Depardieu flees the top tax rate in France, the world's top taxer, but it still manages to be a G7 economy, somehow. And, contrariwise, when a nation coddles its billionaires, and lets them do whatever they want, that's how you get the current US government. Nobody's starving, though. Not yet. We still might check that off with another government shutdown and another trade war escalation and another diplomatic insult or provocation.
  - MadWombat 8y ago
    > provably unambiguous ruleset I think that statement is against the very idea of tax law :)

Or at the very least our entire national tax code should be downloadable in machine-readable form.

analog31 8y ago

It should just be a giant function: def foo(**kwargs): <insert code here> return how_much_you_owe

m0zg 8y ago
It really should be a provably unambiguous ruleset that would take in the person's circumstances and numbers and spit out a number, yes. I understand that your post is a joke, but that'd be an _awesome_ thing to have for everyone, especially if coupled with some adversarial tech to find and close loopholes. Which is, ironically, why this isn't going to happen.
- natechols 8y ago
  I've always assumed that Intuit lobbying alone will be sufficient to kill this idea.
  - m0zg 8y ago
    I think Intuit is just a scapegoat in this case. Incomprehensible tax code is a rich environment for corruption.
    - natechols 8y ago
      Totally true, but I've certainly seen claims that Intuit actually lobbies against simplifying the tax code.
- logfromblammo 8y ago
  This might work: x = gross_income / median_income; if( x <= 1 ) { return 0; } if( x <= 50 ) { y = ( x * Math.ln( x ) - x + 1 ) / Math.ln( 2500 ); } else { y = x - 0.5 * Math.ln( 50 ) * Math.li( x ) + 4.862; } return y * median_income; Math.ln() is the log function for base e, and Math.li() is the logarithmic integral function. The constants are based on the income at 50 times the median income having a marginal tax rate of 50%, and the median income having a marginal tax rate of 0%. Marginal tax rates above 50% asymptotically approach 100%. There are no loopholes or exemptions. If the median income is $32k, and you earned $31k, your tax is zero. Your only obligation is to report your gross income honestly, so that the median income is calculated accurately for next year. If your income is $96k, your x = 3.0, your y = 0.1656, so your tax is $15.9k . If your income is $1.6M, your x = 50, your y = 18.74, so your tax is $600k . If your income is $32M, your x = 1000, your y = 657.5, and your tax = $21M. The only effective ways to reduce your tax would be to reduce your income (as reported) or raise the nationwide median income, such as by paying your lowest-paid workers more in the previous year. Seems fair to me.
  - m0zg 8y ago
    There's one fly in this socialist ointment: all the rich people will immediately bail, and go live elsewhere.
    - c22 8y ago
      It shouldn't matter where they live if they're still making their money here. And if they're not making any money then they're not paying taxes under this scheme anyway.
    - logfromblammo 8y ago
      Ah. Well, that's fine. They can go somewhere else and renounce citizenship, then huff and puff when they start having difficulties getting the money out of the businesses and property they left behind, and getting the knobbly, nail-studded end of the mercantilists' stick. Your argument rests on the presumption that the economy needs super-rich people to be performant, when corporations and governments have already solved the problem of collaborative concentration of capital. If they leave, and the economy somehow fails to collapse, they have shown the lie behind rich folks as "job creators". Economies are run by the people who do the work. Sitting on ass and writing checks serves to weed out some of the worst ideas, and shuffling financial instruments serves to lubricate the gears of the economic machine, but should the rich ever go on strike, they will immediately lose all their leverage as the economy restructures itself to work without them. At worst, they can just get replaced by newly-minted rich people.
      - m0zg 8y ago
        That's how you get Venezuela though. Good luck with that.
        logfromblammo 8y ago
        You get Venezuela with bad government. And they bought theirs with state-owned (nationalized in 1976) petroleum money, not with progressive income taxes. Progressive taxation is how you get Europe. Occasionally, someone like Gerard Depardieu flees the top tax rate in France, the world's top taxer, but it still manages to be a G7 economy, somehow. And, contrariwise, when a nation coddles its billionaires, and lets them do whatever they want, that's how you get the current US government. Nobody's starving, though. Not yet. We still might check that off with another government shutdown and another trade war escalation and another diplomatic insult or provocation.
- MadWombat 8y ago
  > provably unambiguous ruleset I think that statement is against the very idea of tax law :)