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Originally posted by SweetChild
Some states ALREADY pay consumption tax - Texas for instance. We pay 8.25 percent on every dollar we spend, except for food and medicine. We also pay taxes on all utilities and all services. A consumption tax would tax everything at 20 percent or more in this backassard state! People will stop buying. The economy would fail. Yeah! Great idea, let's collapse the economy!
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It would be replaced with a 23 percent consumption tax that people living at or below the poverty rate would not have to pay. The bill would require a "probate" to be paid to all residents that is equal to the consumption tax the poor would normally pay, thus sparing them from taxes completely.
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Originally posted by sligtlyskeptical
This is completely ass backwards like most of what the GOP comes up with. We need to tax income that is not spent on consumption. If you make a million and spend it all on non-assets than you pay no tax. We need to reward spending, not punish it.
Originally posted by WaterBottle
All a consumption tax would do is hurt the poor/middle class. As you can see it already does with the sales tax, which is a consumption tax.
It wouldn't affect rich people as much because they have more money to spare.
Not fair at all. GOP keeps playing it's fan base like a fiddle and they keep buying it for whatever reason. Even when it's directly against their own interests.
edit on 7-1-2013 by WaterBottle because: (no reason given)
During the transition, many or most of the employees of the IRS (105,978 in 2005)[35] would face loss of employment.[36] The Beacon Hill Institute estimate is that the federal government would be able to cut $8 billion from the IRS budget of $11.01 billion (in 2007), reducing the size of federal tax administration by 73%.[36] In addition, income tax preparers (many seasonal), tax lawyers, tax compliance staff in medium-to-large businesses, and software companies which sell tax preparation software (such as Drake Software, TaxCut, and TurboTax), could face significant drops, changes, or loss of employment.[17] Proponents state the income tax industry often provides year round services for financial planning and investment, which is expected to increase under the FairTax proposal and could offset some of these changes.[37] New technologies used by the IRS, such as e-filing, are simplifying the process and already threatening a portion of this industry as goals set by Congress call for at least 80% of federal returns to be submitted electronically by 2007.[38] According to IRS testimony from 2004, 45% of revenue agents and officers would become eligible for retirement in the following 5 years and there is concern about the loss of their work force as their hiring efforts struggle to keep pace with attrition.[39] In addition, the IRS would not go completely out of commission until 3 years after the FairTax was enacted, providing employees time to find other employment.[1] Proponents claim the projected 10.5% growth in the economy during the first year of the FairTax would provide plenty of new jobs to these workers that are typically well educated and well equipped with transferable skills