easysurfer
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
- Joined
- Jun 11, 2008
- Messages
- 13,151
"It's hard to see how the IRS could take on the huge responsibility it would be given under pending health care legislation without some real glitches, or worse," said Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa,
I'd be happy to simplify the IRS's work substantially by getting rid of all the exceptions and special deals in the tax code. How about taxing all capital income at the same rates as labor income? eliminating itemized deductions? getting rid of the alphabet soup of retirement incentives? I'd vote for all of those, I'll bet that Grassley wouldn't.
I'd be happy to simplify the IRS's work substantially by getting rid of all the exceptions and special deals in the tax code. How about taxing all capital income at the same rates as labor income? eliminating itemized deductions? getting rid of the alphabet soup of retirement incentives? I'd vote for all of those, I'll bet that Grassley wouldn't.
I used to think that way about capital gains, but the problem is that a good part of "gain" is lost to inflation so you are taxed on inflation. Given that you cannot deduct inflation from the capital gain I am not so thrilled with taxing the "gain" at ordinary income levels. Except for short term gain, which I think should be taxed as ordinary income.
I agree that the alphabet soup of retirement incentives is unnecessarily complex. I see no reason why you should be able to pile a lot into a 401k but if you don't have a 401k you only can put a nominal amount in an IRA. Standardize the whole thing and make them all portable.
Are you serious?
Taxing LTCG at the same rate as earned income would be okay if indexed for inflation. I don't think it's right to hold high net worth people hostage in order to have them form some kind of political constituency against high inflation--it's not like the US money supply is somehow controlled via direct referendum by people with a net worth over $5M.If necessary, I'd go along with indexing long term cap gains for inflation. Although, I'd prefer that we don't because that would make the wealthiest people in America a political constituency against inflation.
I agree that the alphabet soup of retirement incentives is unnecessarily complex. I see no reason why you should be able to pile a lot into a 401k but if you don't have a 401k you only can put a nominal amount in an IRA. Standardize the whole thing and make them all portable.
Every time the gov't tries to do social engineering, we'll incur administrative expenses. I wonder if Senator Grassley is bothered by what it costs the Agriculture Dept to provide farm payments to 1% of American families. Maybe we should eliminate that expense.
I'd be happy to simplify the IRS's work substantially by getting rid of all the exceptions and special deals in the tax code. How about taxing all capital income at the same rates as labor income? eliminating itemized deductions? getting rid of the alphabet soup of retirement incentives? I'd vote for all of those, I'll bet that Grassley wouldn't.
I used to think that way about capital gains, but the problem is that a good part of "gain" is lost to inflation so you are taxed on inflation. Given that you cannot deduct inflation from the capital gain I am not so thrilled with taxing the "gain" at ordinary income levels. Except for short term gain, which I think should be taxed as ordinary income.
I agree that the alphabet soup of retirement incentives is unnecessarily complex. I see no reason why you should be able to pile a lot into a 401k but if you don't have a 401k you only can put a nominal amount in an IRA. Standardize the whole thing and make them all portable.
I'm not absolutely certain, but I think the $2000 limit on contributions was there from the start. I opened an IRA when I had one of my first jobs during high school (early 1970's) and it sounds awfully familiar. However, IIRC, IRA contributions were tax-deductible for everyone, regardless of income. The mid 1980's sounds about right for when people with higher incomes were no longer able to deduct TIRA contributions.(snip)I'll have to research a little, buit I believe when the IRA first came out, there were no limits to how much you could put in one. I think it was either in 1984 or 1986 they set it at $2000.........
Give me an example of another situation where the federal gov't requires a person to buy a service or product from a private company, and then throws them in jail if they don't comply.
I don't think this is even close to applicable. States don't even require drivers to have insurance unless they drive on public roads. So, it's a requirement levied on citizens wanting to perform a voluntary act. That's a lot different from forcing everyone to buy health insurance as a condition of citizenship.Most state governments require drivers to have auto insurance, or face jail time. Of course, one doesn't have to drive.
... Give me an example of another situation where the federal gov't requires a person to buy a service or product from a private company, and then throws them in jail if they don't comply....
I don't think this is even close to applicable. States don't even require drivers to have insurance unless they drive on public roads. So, it's a requirement levied on citizens wanting to perform a voluntary act. That's a lot different from forcing everyone to buy health insurance as a condition of citizenship.
But even that wouldn't work if we want to also have "community rating" (i.e. coverage costs the same regardless of pre-existing conditions). Ifinsurance is voluntary, all the healthy folks go without insurance and get coverage only when diagnosed with an expensive illness, leading to sky-high insurance rates for the few who would still want to buy it.I suppose there would be no problem having health insurance as optional if as a society we can say to those without insurance who go to the ER, "no insurance, no treatment" but I don't think we are at that point.
I don't disagree that requiring people to buy private health insurance might be good public policy at this point (given public sensibilities at this point). But "good public policy" does not mean it is necessarily constitutional. I think requiring citizens to purchase a private good/service as a condition of residency in the US is likely unconstitutional, and will be found so by the Supreme Court.This measure will, in fact, encourage private responsibility since, to paraphrase easysurfer, we don't leave the dying on the side of the road.