Subject: FEderal Tax System Comment: The existing Federal Income Tax system is desperately disfunctional and in urgent need of replacement with a flat tax system. The most obvious problems with the current tax system are: 1. It costs too much to administer and comply with the law. The direct costs of the IRS are only a minute fraction of the total cost of the system. For each Federal dollar spent on the income tax system, hundreds are spent in the private sector to comply with the law and keep the records needed to protect individuals from the IRS. It has turned us away from production and into a nation paper-shufflers and record-keepers. 2. The sheer complexity of the current system inevitably makes it unfair and arbitrary. No matter how carefully an individual prepares his tax return, he cannot be assured that he has paid his fair share and no more. Even the most civic-minded and honest taxpayer has moments of doubt and unease when he signs the return and drops it in the mail. In a democracy, this is not the way a citizen should feel about an interaction with his government. Much worse, the current system lends itself to, and actively encourages, manipulation of the regulations by special interests for their private interest. As part of my job, I have had access to the tax returns of a number of very high-income individuals and they almost invariably had a lower effective tax rate than I did at a fraction of their income. 3. The current system encourages the Congress to address problems by creating special tax credits and incentives. These never fix the problems they are ostensibly created to address, and they usually make things worse. 4. The esisting system is an egregious invasion of privacy. The law compels us citizens to compile the intimate details of their lives onto IRS forms and then makes the information available to far too many people. At the very least, the tax laws should contain a flat prohibition of the use of tax return information for any purpose other than tax collection. The laws should make it illegal for anyone to demand copies of a tax return in connection with any loan, business transaction, professional license, civil litigation, divorce decree, or any other purpose. Norman James Chaput 47 Lanier Drive Dahlonega, GA 30533 |