8 ms·
Wouldn't a flat tax with a nice high threshold be as non-regressive as you could get? Say X% of everything you make over $30k? Poor people pay roughly zero.
by jasonkester 15y ago
Wouldn't a flat tax with a nice high threshold be as non-regressive as you could get? Say X% of everything you make over $30k? Poor people pay roughly zero. Rich people like us pay almost exactly X%.
Sorted.
Extra points if the government looks at everybody's W-2s & 1099s, decides how much it needs and calculates an X accordingly for that year. Then sends me a bill.
- comicjk 15y agoThat's a nice way to carve out the middle class. Why not just have a graduated tax system with a clean base? It's not the tax brackets that make it complicated, it's the byzantine process of calculating "taxable income."
- bunderbunder 15y agoRealistically, the two are identical. Each is a bracketed, progressive income taxation system. The only thing that distinguishes them is the number of tax brackets. What's often presented as a "flat tax" actually has two brackets. The first, which starts at $0, has a 0% tax. The second, which starts at $X, has a Y% tax.
- caw 15y agoThere's also the "fair tax" approach. Everyone pays the same tax, but everyone also gets a check from the govt on the amount of tax they're expected to spend up to the poverty level. The "fair tax" is pitched on the basis of a sales tax. I don't see a reason why this couldn't be off income tax as well.
- bunderbunder 15y agoHmm. That version sounds worse to me. Doesn't it just take the 2-bracket plan, and add a federal mandate that poor people all have to give the federal government an interest-free loan every year?
- caw 15y agoMy idea may be flawed. The real "fair tax" is a pre-bate each month for the sales tax you'll pay in the month. Which in that way is an interest free loan to you.