Tax Season!

Ugh!!  It’s here. Tax season is upon us, February, March, April, and then taxes are due!

Don’t get me wrong.  I really don’t mind paying taxes.  Yes, really, I’m happy to pay my fair share.  A strong, dynamic, healthy, successful and flourishing nation requires a solid tax base.  BUT!  A solid tax base means one that is fair, just, broad, and simple.  Is our tax system simple, fair, just?  I think not.  And that’s where my aggravation kicks in when I do my taxes.
 
First, doing taxes should not require hours and hours of prep, process, and procedure.  Consider the taxpayer’s nightmare: “Please carefully read IRS publications 55775, 54854, and 3454 in order to properly fill in line 24.  Submit worksheets 1, 2, and 3 for item A and first refer to item C to decide whether you need to complete item A or item B prior to Item C.  See tax code for qualifications and restrictions before completing item A or B.  Ask your tax consultant when all else fails.  If he/she can’t help, add 20% penalty fee for not getting it right in the first place and start the process over to see where you went wrong.  Or better yet, just assume you owe the maximum amount and deserve the least amount of tax credit reduction, then pay-up and shut-up.”

Simplify!  Just simplifying the tax process might help reduce a lot of the pain from paying, let alone making it more equitable and just.  There is an old mechanical engineering adage that says, “The more working parts there are, the more potential there is for breakdown; so keep it simple.” So, likewise, the more obscure, convoluted, and complex a tax system is, the more potential there is for tax fraud, tax evasion, misuse and abuse, and other unfair and unjust inequities.  Yes, I realize that tax software programs such as Turbo Tax and H&R Block makes doing taxes somewhat easier.  But they still refer you to IRS publications, codes, and cautions when you are called upon to make a choice, “Do I file this form or that form, is my documentation adequate, how do I substantiate this with that?” and so-on and so-forth.  The availability of tax software is no excuse for having a complex tax system.  But, since there is a whole industry built around our complicated tax system that would be put out of business if we made doing taxes too simple, we can bet that a simpler tax system is not going to happen anytime soon.

Make it fair and just!  The rich, powerful and wealthy share less of the overall tax burden than do the average American.  Why is this: loop holes, entitlements, special interest groups, favors to business and industry, incentives, and whatnot?  Of course, this won’t change either.  Take the AMT, the Alternative Minimum Tax.  This was meant to prevent the extremely wealthy from escaping to pay their real fair share of taxes on their assets/income (by claiming excessive exemptions for example).  But, over the years it has become yet another encroaching tax burden upon more and more of the middle class.  It’s just around the corner for many of us.  Congress has been “gracious” enough to forestall its inevitable grip upon the middle, middle class.  But they know it brings in too much money for them to simply stop it altogether and tailor it back to become the instrument for which it was created in the first place, a means of making sure the very wealthy pay their fair share of taxes on their wealth.

A fair and just society is not just about due process of law in the criminal courts, as in retributive justice.  A just society is one that is economically just as well, vis-à-vis, distributive justice.  Do all people have a just and fair opportunity for economic gain, growth and stability?  Are all its citizens sharing a just and balance portion of the tax burden?  Or do the laws of business and economy mainly protect and benefit the rich, highly favoring the powerfully wealthy?  History teaches us that one danger for all great nations or empires (Babylonia, Persia, Greece, Rome, the Byzantine Empire, e.g.) is the slow movement toward tax imbalance and injustice; the tax system inevitably moves toward favoring the extremely wealthy at the expense of the majority of the populace.  The middle class shrinks and shrinks, the poor expands and expands, while a wealthy minority begins to control more and more of its nation’s wealth and resources, always a recipe for eventual implosion and/or toppling. 

Difficult as it is to define, a strong nation will maintain a fair and just tax system that is as broad and inclusive as possible, supported by the majority and benefitting the majority of its people.  Our challenge therefore is not just a matter of cutting the deficit and cutting taxes; it’s about assuring that the tax load is evenly distributed and maintains as large a tax base as possible.  It’s about requiring everyone to pitch in and provide their fair share of taxes in accordance with one’s income, wealth, status and position.  For example, this nation chose to engage in two war fronts (Afghanistan and Iraq); now all of us must pay for it.  There will always be liars and cheats, tax evaders and other social/economic riffraff.  Nevertheless, if a system is fair and just overall, most people will be supportive and will not complain, knowing that they are paying for the common good, making us a strong, prosperous and healthy nation.  In the end, none of us can afford to shirk our responsibility as fellow citizens to pay for this nation’s strength, especially the extremely well-to-do.