My Chat with Mitt on Economic Policy: The Expanded Director's Cut

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bgXwYdcmuk of IN @ Apr 13, 2009 13:31:21 PM

Finally, a substantive discussion of the issues...

Refreshing...

Can you imagine W trying to answer these questions?

Imagine Clinton trying to address these questions... Either of them?

To anybody with half a brain and half an open mind, it's obvious that Mitt is the right person to lead this country.

I add my congratulations for being one of the few to focus on substantive issues that matter to our country with a guy that truly has a grasp of how to address them!

Thank you, thank you, thank you...

Kirk Haselden of WA @ Dec 06, 2007 01:12:29 AM

Open Mind on Carbon Taxes!

Romney's response to the question asking whether he has any interest in a carbon tax offset by a cut in payroll taxes is encouraging. Unlike many politicians, he didn't take the easy route and say no new taxes. His statement that he won't be talking about a carbon tax in the campaign is, hopefully, a sign that he is listening to his economic adviser, Professor Greg Mankiw. Professor Mankiw, former Chair of the President's Council of Economic Advisers (2003-05), is a powerful and articulate proponent of carbon taxes (see http://www.carbontax.org/who-supports/scientists-and-economists/#Mankiw). In fact, carbon taxes are supported by economists and opinion leaders across the political spectrum. For background on carbon taxes, see the Carbon Tax Center web site at www.carbontax.org.

Dan of NY @ Dec 05, 2007 15:53:15 PM

Mitt Romney doesn't understand the Fair Tax

Mitt Romney doesn't understand how the Fair Tax works. It absolutely won't increase anyone's cost of living.

I have this to say in defense of the FAIR TAX, HR 25 / S 1025............................

We here in Texas have a state sales tax and it has resulted in NONE! of the dire predictions some have foreseen. There has been no scandal, corruption, or cheating in relation to it. It has funded our state government SPLENDIDLY! We Texans, tourists, illegal aliens, criminals, etc. are all in INSTANT COMPLIANCE!! every time we go through the "cash-register-check-out-line". Virtually no one escapes paying. If it works for Texas it will work for the nation.

THINK ABOUT IT MORE...................................................

Read and Enjoy..................................................

APRIL 15TH????? Let's make it just another Spring day.

HR 25, the Fair Tax Act, is in the House Ways and Means Committee of

congress, waiting to be passed into law. If passed, the Income Tax &

IRS would be abolished and replaced with a national (retail only) sales

tax.

Everyone shoud go to: www.congress.org and tell their congressmen that

they want HR 25 passed into law ASAP!!!! If we all "push together", we

can make it happen. There's nothing to it, BUT TO DO IT!!!!!!

Read and Enjoy.

The FINAL SOLUTION!! for the IRS & Income Tax Problem

50 Reasons I Support the FairTax

(How many reasons can you give for supporting the present obsolete IRS

& income tax system?)

Those Who Know the Facts Love the Fair Tax

"Family Friendly Tax Reform"

Tax Reform with far less pain and much more gain!

Out with the Old Code and in with the New (national RETAIL ONLY sales

tax).

www.fairtax.org

1. It allows you to keep 100% of your paycheck, with nothing withheld

for Social Security and Medicare payments.

2. It eliminates the regressive payroll tax that hurts the poor.

Currently, every one of us is taxed a minimum of 7.65% on our first-dollar of

wages up to $90,000, if we earn that much.

3. It assures that the wealthiest Americans will be voluntarily helping

to fund social security with every last dollar they spend above the

poverty level. Today, earnings are subject to payroll taxes only up to

$90,000. The wealthiest Americans therefore do not pay into the system

above that amount. If their earnings are from investments, no earnings

fund the Social Security system. Under the FairTax, a single purchase

(regardless of the source of the earnings) can result in greater

contributions to the Social Security system than would be paid by an individual

under the payroll tax of today.

4. It provides funding for Social Security and Medicare at a level

equal to or greater than at present, with a stronger and broader tax base.

5. It secures the future of Social Security and Medicare because all

spenders fund it and not just the workers.

6. It eliminates all personal income taxes, payroll taxes, corporate

income taxes, gift taxes, death taxes, and capital gains taxes.

7. It eliminates the income tax and the IRS. Members of Congress and

the public overwhelmingly agree that the current internal revenue code is

cumbersome, intrusive, coercive, and inefficient.

8. It is revenue neutral with the present income tax system, funding

the federal budget at current levels.

9. It will remove an average of 22% of the cost of American made goods

by removing the built-in payroll tax (the other 7.65% of earnings that

employers pay) and other business taxes that are now passed to

consumers as an "embedded" tax of approximately 22% due to the cascading of

income and payroll taxes paid by U.S. employers, at every step of

production, to the U.S. Treasury.

10. It doesn't tax used items ? clothes, cars, homes. Only new items

are taxed when sold by a business to an individual.

11. It is progressive, a "prebate" of the tax amount up to the poverty

level is given to everyone. This means that those spending below the

poverty level have a net gain because the "prebate" exceeds the amount

paid in taxes. (Under the present system they pay the payroll tax even if

they get a full refund of income tax withheld.)

12. It eliminates 90% of the cost of compliance. American families and

American businesses waste an estimated $250 ? $600 billion per year

doing the paperwork necessary to comply with the tax code. That is roughly

$1,000 ? $2,000 annually for every man, woman and child in the U.S.

13. It creates an opportunity for our products to leave this country

costing an average of 25% less, thus increasing our exports, lower our

deficit balance of trade, and increasing employment at home.

14. It encourages investment in companies located in the U.S., thus

providing a home for money already in the US and attracting more. The U.S.

will be the most attractive tax-free haven in the world for doing

business. American companies will return from offshore and overseas.

15. It encourages repatriation to the U.S. of money held by U.S.

individuals and companies now in foreign countries, with no tax consequence.

16. All 290 million Americans and 51 million visiting tourists fund

Social Security and Medicare with their purchases. Today only 110 million

workers fund these programs via deductions from their paychecks.

17. The broader tax base includes the ten percent of our economy, an

estimated $1 trillion, that today is underground or under the table.

Under the FairTax, the illegal drug dealer will pay his tax just like the

rest of us when he buys his sunglasses, BMW, and other items, as will

those who do business for cash.

18. It allows families to save more for home ownership, education, and

retirement. An average family making $50,000 will have $7,500 more

spendable income.

19. It makes educational tuition a tax-free expenditure of tax-free

income.

20. It makes American products more competitive overseas by removing

the embedded tax from them, thus lowering their prices, which compensates

for low foreign wages.

21. It makes American products more competitive at home by removing the

embedded tax from them, compensating for the low cost of imported

products not burdened by taxes imposed by exporting countries.

22. It removes the need for formal 401-K's, IRAs, HSA, etc. Anyone will

be able to set up any kind of savings or investment account without

regard to taxes or the government.

23. It frees churches and other non-profit organizations from the

expense of filing tax returns and paying their half of Social Security and

Medicare payments for employees. There will no longer be any 501.c.3 or

501.c.4 non-profit tax status, because there will be no more tax to be

exempt from.

24. It restores to churches and non-profit organizations the 1st

Amendment right to engage in free speech, without fear of losing their

tax-free status.

25. It gives individuals and businesses the right to donate as much as

they want to in a given year to charitable causes.

26. It restores the 4th Amendment, protecting against unreasonable

searches and seizures, from which the IRS presently is exempt.

27. It restores the 5th Amendment, which guarantees the right to due

process. Under current systems the IRS has their own courts with their

own set of rules not included in the 5th.

28. It cleans up a major flaw in campaign financing, eliminating

campaign donations for "tax favors".

29. It eliminates wrangling in Congress over tax cuts, the tax code,

and who is or is not paying a fair share of the tax bill.

30. It encourages work by letting workers keep 100% of their earnings

and giving a rebate, to boot, making the notion that the more you work,

the more money you have, a reality, unlike the current system where

welfare is lost when you go to work, so your first dollars earned after

taxes just offset what you were currently getting in welfare, making you

no better off.

31. It allows more of the lower income families to become home owners

by allowing a second job income above their current income (all tax

free) to be applied to a mortgage. Money for down payments for homes is

also saved totally tax free so that it will accumulate faster.

32. It allows families to retain farms and businesses in the hands of

those who built them through the elimination of the death tax.

33. It allows families to help each other out tax-free, by eliminating

the gift tax.

34. It encourages individuals to self-insure, making the health system

more direct pay (no 3rd party pay), thus bringing costs down.

35. Without FICA to pay, most states, counties, municipalities, and

school districts will see a large increase in their state budget revenues,

additionally lowering the overall tax burden (State & Federal) for most

Americans.

36. It assures that no American will find, at the end of the year, a

need to get a loan to pay taxes as an alternative to penalties, interest,

or cheating.

37. It restores individual privacy. The government no longer needs to

know where you work, what you are earning, and what you are doing with

it.

38. It eliminates the need to have a "marriage" clarification declaring

who you live with, as that has no bearing at all on a state or federal

sales tax.

39. It eliminates the need for courts to decide which divorced parent

gets to take the tax deduction for children.

40. It reduces production costs for farmers and other subsidized

businesses, leading to a reduction in subsidies, thus reducing the federal

budget.

41. It eliminates the administrative costs incurred by states in

collection of state sales taxes because states will piggyback the state tax

collection onto the national tax collection, for which they are

compensated by the FairTax ?% administrative cost give-back. [Doesn't this go

to the retailers?]

42. It results in a windfall profit for many of those holding taxable

corporate high interest bonds at the time of passage of FairTax, since

they will not be taxed under FairTax. (A higher interest rate is usually

paid to entice investors to buy the corporate bonds rather than go with

the lower interest, but tax free, municipal bonds, now.)

43. It shifts the tax to consumption, which consumption tables over

time show is more stable than income, therefore the tax revenue stream is

likely to be a more stable and predictable amount.

44. It results in Federal Reserve rates being based on current

consumption, which is rather stable, instead of future earnings, which are less

predictable, resulting in surer inflation prevention.

45. It allows for better planning by businesses, because they no longer

have to consider tax implications for everything they do.

46. It makes higher employment or better compensation possible in the

small business sector where today it costs approximately three dollars

in compliance costs to pay one dollar in payroll and income taxes.

47. It moves many now providing tax preparation, advice, accounting,

planning, and records maintenance into an expansive economy where they

will be producing goods and services. There they can add to the standard

of living of all Americans and likely earn more than they do currently,

instead of shuffling paper for the government (and not contributing

anything economically to society).

48. It relieves citizens of the risk of facing the shift in burden of

proof that is so common with the current system, i.e., the taxpayer is

guilty unless innocence can be proved, when even IRS staff sometimes

give conflicting interpretations.

49. It's simple, unambiguous, and certain, the opposite of the current

tax code.

50. It's good for the environment. It reportedly would save about

300,000 trees a year that are needed to produce the paper for the IRS

compliance and tax forms, enough to reach around the equator placed end to

end 28 times. Also, since it taxes only new items, it would encourage

buying tax-free pre-owned cars, clothes, furniture, houses, etc. Reuse is

good for the environment, too.

PLEASE CONSIDER THIS ALSO:

22% of all that you buy currently is tax / tax compliance cost. When that cost goes away (under the Fair Tax) the price of your $1.00 item (purchased at Wal-Mart, for example) drops in price to 78 cents (without damaging the profit margin).

1.23 X 78 cents = 96 cents.

Seeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!! Even with the 23% Fair Tax added on, your originally $1.00 item is now 4 cents cheaper.

The "out-of-pocket" cost of living , under the Fair Tax , will be no more than it is now.

Under the Fair Tax there are NO LOSERS, only winners, the difference being that some win BIGGER!!!! than others due th their increased FRUGALITY.

Best Regards,

John Paul McDaniel

Go to: www.fairtax.org

John Paul McDaniel of TX @ Dec 05, 2007 10:54:12 AM

Thank you

Thank you Mr. Pethokoukis for taking the time to talk to a candidate about something that matters!

PN of NH @ Dec 05, 2007 10:15:00 AM

Romney's right on.

This is the Romney I want to see more of. GO Mitt 2008!!

Lars of DC @ Dec 05, 2007 09:37:44 AM

He's Mormon?

I love it...This guy's Mormon? Who cares...This guy is sharp. A candidate like Romney only comes around every half-century or so. He will make a great president.

Jared of TX @ Dec 05, 2007 08:20:56 AM

It is pretty refreshing to hear substantive answers to substantive questions in this campaign for a change. Give me someone who has Mitt's experience and intellect any day over the other politicians and this includes all the Republicans, Democrats, and any Independents that may run. No wonder Mitt's far ahead of the crowd in New Hampshire, where I believe they take substantive issues seriously.

Rockyspoon of @ Dec 05, 2007 07:21:50 AM