Jim, You could not possibly offend me!
While I do not often post on this thread, I do read all your posts. The excepts I posted were from a book I was playing with a couple of years ago that I called Buy and Hold with a Twist. That chapter I called Pirates and Other Scoundrels. The basic premise was that, as has been the case since the beginning of recorded time, the system is by its nature designed to part you from your money by hook or crook. However, that being a given, the individual is responsible for their decisions in life -- investment or otherwise.
As a practicing tax accountant for more than two decades, I have voiced your feelings on numerous occasions. I hear a lot of complaints in April, but few in September. In this spirit, the finance minister to Louis XIV was said: "The art of taxation can be likened to plucking a goose. The goal is to get the most amount of feathers with the least amount of squawking."
As to your final issue, the disposition of social security funds, I have not made up my mind and enjoy your thoughts. I'm just not sure that it is not more corrupt to hand these funds to Congress, call it income (without recording the greater liability), declare a budget surplus, and proceed to argue about how the surplus should be spent.
Berney |
