A Dubious System Keeps Mums Home The Age Take a look at an interesting article we found.
Link Bailout to Tax Reform Boston Globe Take a look at an interesting article we found.
Massachusetts Proposal Would Repeal Income Tax The New York Times Take a look at an interesting article we found.
Andrew McAuley threw his life away trying to become the first person to kayak from Australia to New Zealand leaving a wife and a 3-year old son behind. And we can only ask why?
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October 03, 2008
Big day for taxpayers today. I suppose what the bail out means determines how high a plane we bail from.
Sometimes, you have to remind yourself where you came from to understand where you are.
That's why I keep a copy of the original 1913 income-tax code on my bookshelf. Unfortunately I can’t use it today.
The history books will tell you that it was Wyoming's vote in the affirmative that gave the 16th Amendment the three-quarters majority needed to amend the Constitution and tap into our personal income.
My conservative friends would say,"Confiscate."
In truth, the confiscating began before that. The first income tax was an "emergency measure" passed during the Civil War, but was repealed in 1872. Even the Commissioner of Internal Revenue wrote the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, saying that the income tax was "most obnoxious, inquisitorial and expository."
Where are those commissioners today?
In 1894 the income tax returned as "an act to reduce taxation, to provide revenue for the government, and for other purposes." The Washington Post characterized it as "an abhorrent and calamitous monstrosity that punishes everyone who rises above the rank of mediocrity."
A year later the Supreme Court found the income tax unconstitutional because it was a "direct" tax not apportioned among the States based on population, as the Constitution required.
So a constitutional amendment was put forward, ratified by the states, and in 12 simple words -- The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes - our world was changed forever.
Of course, in 1913, the tax code was a bit simpler than it is today. The 1040 form was a mere four pages long. It levied a 1% tax on net personal incomes above $3,000. There was a 6% surtax on incomes of more than $500,000.
Although the income tax was brand new, it came with deductions. $3,000 for individuals; $4,000 for married couples. Taxpayers could also deduct business expenses, interest on personal debt, state and local taxes paid, and, my personal favorite, "Losses actually sustained during the year incurred in trade or arising from fires, storms, or shipwreck."
And if you survived and caught cheating on your taxes, the penalty was an additional 100% of the tax owed.
Farmers, who still made up a large swath of the population, even had their own provisions.
Despite these exceptions, the income tax was remarkably simple and short. The entire 1913 federal tax code was written on 400 pages.
Today, the complete tax code, with accompanying regulations, contains over 60,000 pages and is so complicated that even CPA’s don’t understand it. At least mine doesn’t.
The only plus is that the IRS might be a little hazy on it too. And that of life's two certainties, it's the one you can get an extension on.
We're all for paying our fair share. Maybe, we can make the process a bit...dare I say, less daunting.
Awaiting your thoughts here at the Eye. And try not to tax yourself. The Government will do that for you.
Share the Eye:
Sorry I've been out of touch for a few days. I just purchased the first two seasons of Rumpole of the Bailey on DVD and have not been able to tear myself away.
Ah, taxes! Just be glad you don't get all the government you pay for!
My father, author of the previous quote, always used to say: The government is different from the Mafia. Both will point a gun at your head and say "You give us money, we'll give you protection." The difference is the Mafia really provides the protection.
This tax business is vexatious. But She Who Must Be Obeyed and I have had damned near enough of it, especially given the lovely little proviso in the current "Bail Out" legislation - or in deference to DRP's new DVD, should I say "Bailey Out" - to make banks act as agents of the gummint. Now the Feds don't merely want to tax it. They flat out WANT IT.
So the government will have the power to tax, AND the power to determine my access to MY money in the bank? I bloody well think not. Near the end of September, I officially became my own bank (the Pontiff Central Bank keeps a nominal account in my name, of course). Not only am I now my own banker, but I make my deposits in non-Dollar(US) denominated currencies, and for that matter my new bank deposits are only "currencies" in the sense that they are minted by Austria and South Africa. Gold and silver coin will never go "out", and like national "fiat" currency they will always retain value. Maybe even accrue it. But more to the point, a shocking sum of money can be handily dropped into one's pocket and carried out of the country on a darling little sailboat - if you happen to own one. Our Gentleman host, Mssr. Peterman has a farm in Kentucky to which he likes to retire for a little manual labor. He recommends we get one? I have a little patch of real estate that rolls a bit in a following sea, but otherwise demands little and returns much. I recommend you get one. And when the banks come calling for the money of mine that they don't have anymore, at the behest of the newest Mafia on the block AKA The Fed, I'll go to my little escape pod. We'll sail out three miles and turn left. The boat might sit a little low in the water, what with the metal cargo she'll be hauling in the bilges. Some things shiny, some things more black and glinty, all of them valuable in their own milieux.
I'm no Socratic idiot to sit own and drink my just desserts wine (Famous last words: "I drank what???") when the Senate says so. I vote with my feet. Only a few more Red Lines need to be crossed before She Who Must be Obeyed and I make the ultimate footie vote. Taxes are fine. Banking bailouts are fine. But the moment my government decides that its blinkered monetary policies must also be mine, then I'll be toodling off to somewhere south of Santiago, and I hope to enjoy some of your company there. A little fly fishing. A little sailing. A LOT of acai & Boodles.
I consider myself to be very Conservative, so it makes sense that I would feel how I do about taxes (I'm in favor of the FairTax).
"Nothing is certain but death and taxes"
Of course we have to pay something to The Man, but I'm in favor of keeping it to a minimum. The government needs money to function of course, but I'm one of the rugged individualists that believes we (individuals, businesses, etc.) should be able to do what they want without being hindered by the government.
I've worked for a small business for quite sometime, and seeing how much money is taken from the average person honestly makes me ill. Imagine what they could do were they trusted with it...
I've caught a mis-print in my post! Ye gods. It's the end.
I should have said "UNLIKE fiat currencies..."
Do forgive.
I've become somewhat neutral on taxes. I do think the tax code is nonsense and tax reform is badly needed. But my neutrality is based on the fact that no matter who we vote into office it's either "tax and spend" or "spend then tax". There seems to be nothing, as a voter, I can do to change the system.
Here in California, we get to vote on Propositions and Measures that seek to impose new taxes. I often vote "No" because when passed, the money seems to never be enough or goes somewhere else.
Soon we'll have another trillion in National Debt with the financial bail-out...needed or not, I promise we'll have new government agencies, new regulations, new armies of beauracrats and an endless money-mouth to feed with more taxes.
They say there's nothing certain but death and taxes....well, yesterday, we resolved the death issue with the Fountain of Youth, so now we're left with taxes....one out of two isn't bad (LOL)
Remember, there are states who do not tax the incomes of their citizens, or who tax only some of them. This is public knowledge, but I don't see people moving there in droves - except to Florida. DPR, your father stole my thunder. As much as I dislike paying (and paying and paying) income tax, I am pleased and delighted that much of that money buys something I don't see or contend with.
In these parts, the pet theory of the moment is OPM. Other People's Money. The most obnoxious taxes and fees are accepted because they only apply to other people. And let's face it, that is what sold the Tax Code. Tax the Other. Accommodations taxes are popular in a lot of places. Call them what they are- tourist taxes. The lottery is widely described as a stupidity tax. Gasoline taxes don't bother people who don't drive, or not directly.
I know it's slightly off topic, but my favorite is the advocacy by notorious zillionaires of reviving the inheritance tax. When Bill Gates decides it's a good idea to tax estates of $2 million and up, do you suppose it might be because he has already sheltered many multiples of that for his heirs? The Estate Tax was never a problem for the people whose dead relatives left them four times the minimum amount, or for those lucky ones whose relateves left them 95% of the taxable amount. The problem was for those decent, honest folks who were made liars by an estate that was just Over the amount.
How much can you "massage" this appraisal, sir?
That depends, did you want to sell it or were you going to pay taxes on it?
Never mind replacement value.
Eeels, I admire your discipline. For ten days out of most months, I don't have enough money in ANY bank for anybody to worry about. The other months it's more like twenty.
Every other day, every other day I get the blues
Every other day, every other day I get the blues
Some times it's monday wednesday friday, sometimes its thursday tues.
They tend to sneak up on me, they always knock me flat
They may be gone tomorrow
But they're back the day after that.
Working for the weekend? Shoot man, that weekend ain't gone work for Me!
I think all this gives me a giant headache, at this point since all my taxes are paid and I essentially have no money in my devalued accounts ....I think I will return to yesterday's topic of the fountain of youth, or the miraculous ability to turn wine into water
Here's a question: If tax reductions are good for the economy (Republican mantra) and if 'deficits don't matter' (Dick Cheney), why not simply eliminate ALL taxes and fund the resultant deficit by borrowing, presumably by the stupidist folks in the world (our creditors the Chinese and Japanese, I presume)?
This method is called reductio ad absurdum, and it really isn't absurd. What's absurd is that when I ask my right-wing friends this question, they never answer it, but go off on rants having nothing to do with a rational response to my very serious question. Any takers?
On a totally different tack is an old George Bernard Shaw quote: "A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul. - George Bernard Shaw" This is one of the ultimate refutations of the dreams (once shared by me) of reducing taxes, getting deficits under control, and eliminating the national debt. Ain't gonna happen in a democracy. Interestingly, Russia HAS paid off its national debt! One more advantage that an autocracy like that of Czar Putin has over 'the American way'.
Don't get me wrong, the deficit won't go up forever. When interest on the ever increasing national debt consumes the entire Federal budget (I expect to see that day), action will result: either massively devaluing that debt with hyperinflation (cf Zimbabwe), or simply cancelling it (Agentina, 2002 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argentine_debt_restructuring )
I imagine it's very exciting to be married to a guy who makes $100,000 a year and spends $200,000 a year on you (any ex-wives care to comment?). And manageing to stiff the credit card companies, mortage holders, gullible friends and relatives, and one's banker must be even more of a rush!
We live in interesting times!
Doc- There's a happy medium. Plainly saying, "Deficits don't matter" is the same as assuming that $30,000 in credit card debt is the same as purchasing a house on which on plans and is able to make payments to (eventually) own. Cheney was right in that a deficit isn't the ultimate gauge of a strong economy, but it is important that our money, while we can't avoid overseas trading, remain in the domestic sphere and be reinvested in out economy.
No one in their right mind advocates killing all taxes as the government does require money to operate, but when CPAs can't even agree on what the heck the tax code means, it's time to pass sweeping reforms.
i didn't think you'd make me laugh about taxes, but you did. Now, if I could only pay them.
Lately I can't get the old nostrum out of my head: "Borrow a little from your bank and they own you. Borrow a lot, and you own them."
I think that little idea above is at the heart of our country's rampant debt-selling. We need to sell MORE of it, so that the United States can in fact own the bank. Under President Shrub, we've made admirable strides toward the goal of world conquest, and this administration clearly aims to gild that lilly as much as possible before they leave office.
Well, here in France we pay more taxes than any other wealthy nation.
My husband makes a fairly good salary. When I work part-time on top of it (I want to be available for the kids) it seems we don't really get ahead; we just pay more taxes.
Which is not necessarily a bad thing... given that my salary is not direly needed, I am free to pursue my bliss (music, when I make serious money one day, that'll be another story, I suppose). And besides, I know that if ever I'm in need, this country can provide free childcare, rent subsidies, and other interesting benefits to the poverty-stricken. It's a sort of insurance, IMHO.
I've instructed my wife that upon my death, my mortal remains should be cremated and shipped to the IRS with a note that says, "Now you have it all."
more on the honor rollAm I the only person who doesn't know what the hell is going on in the world?
Have lots of extra space under my desk if anyone else wants to take up residence here with me.
Willie, I live by and sometimes work in one of those income tax free states, Wyoming. Trust me, there's a reason why people aren't moving there in droves. Especially in Teton county where many people can't afford to own land because of the property taxes. I do like the state of Wyoming's revenue website, check out the FAQ (I like the one about the wedding cake)
http://revenue.state.wy.us/PortalVBVS/DesktopDefault.aspx?tabindex=4&tabid=11
One thing is for sure, taxes seem to get easier to do and harder to pay the poorer I get. Oh well. Now who wants to drive up the canyon with me tonight to see if we can spot any landlocked salmon spawning?
DreadPirateRoberts,
In the late eighties, we were in London to visit two of our daughters who were there on a work exchange program through their university.
A weekday afternoon found us at Covent Garden where they disappeared into a shop selling soaps and such with overpowering floral and herbal scents. I could not have been forced into the place at gunpoint.
Interested in locating a door with a "Gents" sign, I recalled a caution from the girls that in that place and at that time. it was considered bad form to just pop in somewhere for that purpose and that some purchase, however gratuitous, was called for.
Spotting, on the next level, a stylish, nearly empty oaky, brassy English-what else?-Pub, I worked my way up there. It didn't take Stephen Hawking to realize that I was in pretty tall cotton with a mezzanine view of everything below.
The barman, seeming to recognize my situation, suggested:"Perhaps a half pint, sir?" And ordering one for the first and last time but one, I made the visit and upon returning, could find no good reason not to try their luncheon special as well.
It was a thick slab of juicy ham between crusty bread with grainy Dijon. This just kept improving.
As wonderful as that warm and delicious sandwich had been, the ale had been even better. As I sat slowly turning the empty glass on its coaster, the barman, intuitively sensing a opening, offered to refill it at the pint price. The first half beginning to take affect, I nodded.
"With a smile forming at the corners of his mouth, Jack, the barkeep set the hook!" boomed the one other man at the bar and we all laughed.
Had I not already known Horace Rumpole, I would have recognized Leo McKern his image plastered as it was over every train and station on playbill posters pumping his starring role in a production whose name I have forgotten.
Anyone?
I've spent the subsequent twenty years regretting my inability to weave "The Penge Bungalow Murders" cleverly into the brief conversation that followed but it tops the list as my all-time great non-family lunch experience.
Cheers
Oh, taxes? They seem a bit high.
Besides taxes, my other pet peeve (actually a big one) is when people tell me now I'm sudccessful I should "give back". You give back when you stole something. I don't remember stealing my money, I have no damn intention of giving it back (and to whom do i give it back? those who don't work?)
I give to charities because I want to...I choose the charities carefully...the first charity is my family, the second,needy friends (very carefully, because I never expect it back), then charities i believ are truly worthwhile and accomplish something (I listed them in a prior post).
Sometimes I give my time (very valuable); sometimes money (not so valuable).
My really pet peeve is government thinking (an oxymoron). Example: Here in California we have a license plate program where you can purchase personalized plates or other types of plates. One of the others is a veteran's plate. So I, being a veteran, decided to go to the DMV and ask for one. It would have my branch of service, and the war I was in. At that time it was $50 to buy. I asked where does the money go, because this was four times the price of a regular plate. The DMV employee said the money went to help veterans. Go figure! I'm a veteran and I was paying for my own plate. Why not just let me keep the $50, give me the plate and know that you just helped a veteran by letting me keep my $50.
I never bought the plate...I have a regular plate with a nice frame ($10) that says "U.S. Marine Corps, Vietnam Veteran".
My Irish Grandmother used to say "Charity starts at home"......right you are granny!
Miss Ive: Definitely you are not the only one. Remember Lange, a very charismatic pshyciatrist, who propounded the idea that psychotic people were simply having a normal reaction to a crazy world? If Palin, a 700-billion-dollar bailout, Bush, Putin, Iraq, melting icecaps, human breast-milk ice cream at Ben and Jerry's----how can that be anything other than a crazy world? I think you and I are among the younger posters on this site (and thus maybe lack the experience and wisdom of others here), but I've come really to fear my coming decades. I wish someone could persuade me otherwise. I fear becoming a "sane psychotic."
Boy nothing puts me off of ice cream faster than putting the words "human breast milk" in the sentence with it.
Pastry anyone?
Mark Swaim,
Did you say young? And physician? See, now that's a subject I can get on board with. Kidding.
As far as politics, this is how my head works. My baby sis, who is still nursing her first child, told me the PETA and Ben & Jerry's bit last weekend. We spent about two seconds (read: zero seconds) taking the matter seriously and engaging in political debate. And then we started to tease out how their pitch would play out.
Me: So, will we have to send them our own breast milk and they will churn it into the flavor of our choice?
Sis: Um, or maybe we can invent our own flavor, since it is technically OUR 'brand,' too, at that point.
Me: Oh. Good point. So, what will your flavor be?
Sis: Hmmmm. Mine will have toffee in it. Toffee goes well with breast milk. I accidentally tasted some when Grace spit up near my mouth.
Me: Toffee? Yeah. I could do toffee. Maybe coffee toffee? We need a cool name.
Sis: Well, we call nursing 'nummies,' so it will have to have Nummy in the title.
Me: Definitely. Love it.
And that's me on political issues. Very easily side tracked.
Did somebody say something about taxes?
mark swaim; Miss1ve,
After making breakfast for my wife, she and I spent a nice half hour on the iSight web cam visiting with our daughter, her husband and young son a thousand miles away.
I held her close before she left saying the same things I do every day and meaning them. She knows it.
Small things? I suppose so but immensely appreciated.
Key thing, appreciation. Do it and good things happen within you. Your thoughts and attitudes slow and soften. Your heart warms and it becomes difficult to embrace cynicism and skepticism. Sarcasm and irony remain however like toast and jam.
My point is that good things happen to the positive and appreciative among us being fertile ground for abundant propagation. We just expect them.
On the other hand, fear and bleakness are at least as likely, maybe more, to reproduce themselves, creating darker and darker outcomes... as expected.
You know that something is sitting nearby just awaiting your gratitude. Give it a shot.
Good luck
MissIve I just read your post...I had just gotten to the dialogue when my extension rang, I picked it up and was still reading and I actually LAUGHED into the phone. *slaps forehead* That's what I get for multi-tasking at work.
Stoney, you are such a great story teller, can you come to my house and tuck me in and tell me a story every night? My husband isn't as eloquent as you are when it comes to stories.
Stoney,
I second nachista's admiration for your storytelling. Your vaule of "small things" reminds me of one of the bits of advice in a book I have, called Father to Daughter. It says "Enjoy the moments when she falls asleep on your chest; this is when the world starts to make sense." Amen.
Randomly meeting Leo McKern at a pub is absolutely priceless. I was also in London in the late 80's. My family went there in 1988 and my Dad (who had first turned me on to Rumpole) visited the Old Bailey. I think that was the day I went to the Theatre Museum. Now, I wish I'd gone with him.
When I first came to New York, I lived at the dorm rooms of the 92nd Street Y. One of the perks of residencey there was free tickets to any non-sold out presentation downstairs at Kaufman Auditorium. When John Mortimer came to read, I jumped at the chance to hear him. It was interesting how he confessed that, after McKern made the part his own, he actually changed his writing to more closely suit McKern's interpretation. Later, I met him and he signed my program. I sent it to my Dad, not normally a fan of autographs but I knew he'd want this one.
Stoney,
It worked so well, you didn't even remember the VAT they soaked you with. Interestingly, the VAT is refundable on consumer goods taken out of the UK, but that doesn't include the ones taken out in your innards.
Nachista, I was in your beautiful sparse state over the fourth of July, as I was about 34 years earlier. This second time, I stopped off in Cook(e) City MT to have supper. My friend let me have a bite of her buffalo steak. The waitress was a hippie hottie. We saw marmots on the road. My friend enjoyed herself so much, she bought a quarter horse Unless I am mistaken, horses are neither taxed nor licensed, which makes them very special in the world of transportation and pretty unusual in the world of expensive hobbies. I guess they tax the feed. Or maybe it is the congressional appetite for horse byproduct that makes them sympathetic.
I have to wonder, though, if having only one Member o' Congress has anything to do with having no income tax.
There's only one thing worse than income tax: Property tax. It sucks having to pay taxes on your HOUSE! For the simple reason of owing it.
Where's John Galt when we need him?
Children, sit still and Mummy Olivia will tell you a story, in bad French. So, you gotta PAY ATTENTION! Or not...
Il etait une jeune fille qui a pompe tes seins. Elle a fut si beaucoup de lait que l'enfant au sein etait accabler, elle a puer que l'enfant aura de l'embonpoint! Qu'es ce qu'on fait avec le laitage en sus? Elle il met dans le congelateur, et elle a dit a sa mari a-t-il utiliser pour l'enfant quand elle a travaille'. Pas de problem, oui? Elle etait tres heureux qu'il a utilise' souvent tout de lait. Mais, l'enfant n'engraisse pas. Miracle! Elle a pose a son mari, "pourquoi? es-tu faire des exercise avec l'enfant?" Il a reponde' "non, j'il met le lait sur mon cereale en flocons chaque jour-c'es tres douce!"
Quel explosion!
There's more, but that pretty much covers the scene...very taxing it was. See? I stayed on topic!
Nachista & DPR,
You guys are too easy but sweet and, dare I say, Appreciated!
Willie Trask,
It was actually the exchange rate: x2, that took the fun out of shopping.
I remember agonizing over the purchase of a small Seamus Parkes volume of but maybe a dozen poems unable to pull that spendy little trigger.
Only months later, a friend whom I had not seen or had contact with in decades, sent me a copy that had been languishing for years unclaimed and unwanted on the shelves at the airline he worked for.
"Kept seeing this and kept thinking of you," he wrote, "Hope you enjoy it."
What more can I say?
"RESISTANCE IS FUTILE"
I just threw a tea bag into the Kishwaukee River and nothing happened.
Stoney,
I sit here in a state of awe, which is a little to the right of Idaho, and doff my cap to your wonderful posts.
Thank you for your response to my "cough syrup slushy" analogy yesterday; it helped me maintain my fast for today's blood test.
I think we may have grown up in different households together.
Peter, you are the cutest, and I am in awe of your pics. I have a new one, shall I put it up? You can meet my leetle friend!
Peter,
A smaller receptacle would help to strengthen the flavor of the tea.
ExPat,
Well said about that grotesque fallacy of "giving back". One wonders how the users of such a phrase would define the word, "earn".
Olivia please tell me your breast milk story isn't true! When I run out of milk I have a bagel instead of cereal.
Olivia,
I'd love to meet your leetle friend.. . . and thank you for your kind words, but you are definitely the cutest, I insist.
Nachista, you're not a GUY, if you know what I mean. Actually, he preferred it warm lol. All right, then-I'll TELL you that it's not true...but.
Ok, Pete-I'll defer to your judgement. You are still pretty darn cute, though! Can you see him there, in the pic? He's really cute, too! The perfect date, not picky and no backchat!
Olivia,
Leetle green friend, meet one of my leetle blue friends...
Just wanted to pop in and say 'breast milk' one more time on Peterman's Eye. Have thoroughly ruined my ice cream appetite for the next hour, at least.
Happy weekend, all!!!
Nachista, so glad to blur your personal/professional line. Always my goal!
It's not just for breakfact any more. . . . .