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To: LindyBill who wrote (69784)	9/13/2004 8:20:15 AM
From: Neil H	Respond to of 793974

Amen to this. I couldnt believe how complicated they made it for me to fill out my kids taxes just because I sold a couple of their stocks. REVIEW & OUTLOOK Tax Reform Revisited September 13, 2004; Page A20 Presidential campaigns are many things -- exciting, annoying, boring and exhausting -- but among their more useful functions is to establish a mandate for governing. So we are pleased (and, yes, excited) to note that President Bush is beginning to promote the cause of tax reform. In his New York convention speech, Mr. Bush laid down the broad principles that tax reform must satisfy. With a friendly nod toward the desirability of home ownership (read the mortgage deduction) and charitable giving, he called for "a simpler, fairer, pro-growth system." And he's promised to appoint a bipartisan advisory panel to generate specific ideas, probably in early 2005. Which shouldn't be too taxing given that the current system is complicated in the extreme, involves a ton of inequities and distortions, and could do much better by growth and investment. Consider: Simplicity. The current system with its deductions, exemptions and credits -- many of which phase-in and then phase-out at different income levels -- piles complexity on complexity. As Mr. Bush said in his speech, our tax system is ". . . a complicated mess -- filled with special interest loopholes, saddling our people with more than six billion hours of paperwork and headache every year." Fairness. Right now, the tax burden falls unevenly. In the big sense, it stretches the principle of vertical equity, otherwise known as progressivity. The current system is so steeply progressive that the top half of taxpayers pay over 96% of total income taxes. The top 5% pay about 50%. Since fewer Americans are paying income taxes -- almost 40 million file but don't pay -- the political consensus for low tax rates is undermined. Workers who pay no taxes or a very little share may be indifferent about voting tax relief for others and are insulated from recognizing the true costs of government. The current code also violates the principle of horizontal equity that people with the same income pay the same taxes. Depending on the composition of a particular taxpayer's household, Americans with identical incomes pay wildly different taxes. (One of the big differences is whether or not a household can take advantage of $1,000 per child tax credits.) Pro-growth. It's hard to imagine a tax code that is less sympathetic to growth. Currently, the system levies a tax on saving and investing and its steep progressivity discourages risk-taking. The result is a chronically low savings rate and much less entrepreneurial activity than we might have. That, of course, translates into lower productivity and weaker economic growth. It is a small but distinct irony that President Bush himself has contributed to the current code's complexity, inequities and economic inefficiency. Not only has he removed almost four million workers from the tax rolls, he enlarged the universe of tax breaks, particularly the child tax credit. Worse, in this campaign he is promising to create new tax credits -- for example, for both employees and businesses to create Health Savings Accounts. We like HSAs as much as anyone, but if they're attractive on the merits they don't need this additional tax subsidy. So in a sense Mr. Bush's reform call is a matter of atoning for his own mistakes -- and his political timing may be right. Republicans in Congress have been pushing it. And notable Democrats have also been exploring the concept, including Wesley Clark in the Democratic primaries and Illinois Representative (and Clinton loyalist) Rahm Emanuel. They all know that every year the sneaky Alternative Minimum Tax reaches further down into the ranks of middle-income taxpayers. In just six years, somewhere between one-quarter to one-third of all taxpayers will be liable to pay the AMT, which snares tax filers who qualify for such large deductions as the one for state and local taxes. This is a problem too big to be tinkered with around the edges, as the Administration and Congress have so far been doing. There are several possible reforms to explore, ranging from a flat tax to some kind of tax on consumption. But any reasonable reform would have to reduce loopholes (and thus the need to phase them in-and-out), lower rates, and abolish the tax bias against saving and investment. The result would be a simpler system, easy for taxpayers to figure out, and transparent so that the price of government services are readily visible. It would deliver a whole lot more equity among taxpayers and tax neutrality among economic activities, and a whole lot fewer distortions. All of which is just an economist's way of saying what the President did: We need a new tax system. Why don't we spend the 50-some days between now and November 2 debating it online.wsj.com

To: LindyBill who wrote (69784)	9/13/2004 8:21:49 AM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 793974

BASHING FROM THE BOOTH NY DAILY NEWS ABC Sports star Al Michaels sure likes to put the political back in "political football." So CNN "Crossfire" hosts and Democratic strategists James Carville and Paul Begala want to penalize the apparently Republican-leaning Michaels for unnecessary roughness. During his play-by-play of the New England Patriots-Indianapolis Colts game in Foxborough, Mass., last week - a special Thursday edition of "Monday Night Football" - Michaels somehow discovered an opportunity to stick it to John Kerry. When co-announcer John Madden marveled at the seesawing of the score - "This is what you call a flip-flop," he said - Michaels retorted: "You're in the right state for that." By which Michaels meant Massachusetts, the home state of the Democratic presidential nominee, who's constantly being accused by President Bush's campaign team of "flip-flopping" on the issues. "These announcers are getting to think they're some kind of political commentators or pontificators," Carville told me. "But the football fans watch football to hear about football. If Al Michaels wants to give his political opinions, tell him to come on 'Crossfire.'" Begala, meanwhile, told me: "I hardly ever watch ['Monday Night Football'] anymore. It's the television equivalent of Sominex. And they have had all these right-wingers on: Dennis Miller, Rush Limbaugh and Al Michaels - and all it does is drive viewers away." But Begala said he isn't worried that Michaels will sway voters toward Bush: "I don't think anybody's going to base their vote on what someone wearing a polyester blazer in an announcer's booth thinks." Michaels wouldn't address the Democrats' complaints, and ABC Sports spokesman Mark Mandel said: "We don't respond to nonsense." In any case, "Monday Night Football" is in Charlotte, N.C., tonight, so maybe Michaels will have a chance to deliver a Republican talking point about Sen. John Edwards. nydailynews.com