Sparing the pain

A tax that will, at last, bring justice to the afflicted wealthy

by Bryan Zepp Jamieson

08/26/03

http://www.zeppscommentaries.com/Humor/pain.htm

Since it’s becoming painfully obvious that George W’s catastrophic economic policies have opened up a huge deficit, and this aggravated the tanking of the general economy, this has led many states, including quite a few red ones, to painfully bite the bullet and painfully raise taxes. Every governor who has done this while slashing aid to the least powerful members of society has called it painful.

The GOP wants to spare people that pain.

They want to spare the pain of people like Ken Lay, or the Waltons. Substantial people. People of means.

People who are much more sensitive to pain.

They must be. After all, a tax hike that would cost Ken Lay an extra $15,000 a year, bring his tax burden up to $15,000, would hurt him as much as discovering you lost a dime through a hole in your pocket hurts you. Rich people are just more sensitive than you or me.

In fact, that’s why they’re rich. It’s because they’re sensitive.

Here in California, of course, we’re approaching the painful process of tax hikes completely bass-ackward, according to the experts at the Wall Street Journal. We have schemes that include restricting the hikes on car registration to kick in only on cars with a value greater than $20,000 (Bustamante’s platform), and an initiative calling for a 1% surtax on income over one million dollars in order to fund the state’s badly crippled mental health programs. You would think some guy making $1,001,000 a year would be happy to fork over an extra $10 a year if it helped society figure out what to do with the toothless old guy with the squeegee and greasy rag who hangs out near the Civic Center, but it’s that darn sensitivity thing. The only thing that hurts worse than watching sick people suffer needlessly is a 1% tax hike on anything over a million in income.

Making the rich pay for the needs of the people whose shoulders they stand upon is just so darned insensitive, you know?

But the GOP knows a way to alleviate the pain.

They want a flat tax.

Now, they tell us that the flat tax is the fairest thing on earth. It doesn’t matter if your income is 5 billion dollars or five thousand. Everyone pays the same percentage. Most flat tax plans mention somewhere from 10% to 18% for everyone. If you make $5,000, you would pay from $500 to $950. If you make five billion, you would pay anywhere from $500,000,000 to $950,000,000. What could be fairer than that?

Of course, the guy making $5 billion a year would need a few breaks here and there. After all, his investments might turn sour, and society should be prepared to cover his risks if they do. After all, that’s the spirit of entrepreneurism that made the railroads and the defense corporations so great, right? Standing tall and proud, and taking charity from no man, but just having their losses covered. Just a little. By the taxpayers. So they wouldn’t feel any pain. It makes the heart go pitty pat. So you would have deductions here and there for stuff like maintaining a huge estate, and having security, and tons of accountants and lawyers, and upkeep on the private jet (don’t want it plowing into some poor community’s school now, do we?) and so on.

So you lop off a little bit here, and a little bit there.

With the result that both the guy making $5,000 and the guy making $5 billion end up paying $650 each, and what could possibly be fairer than that? The billionaire just has headaches the thousandaire doesn’t, and that needs to be taken into account.

$650 each. That’s as flat a tax as you could possibly hope to see.

What could be fairer?

When I got done sobbing convulsively over the plight of the billionaires in our country (the part about having to pay for all those accountants and lawyers I found particularly heart-wrenching), I saw, like a beacon on the hill, a flat tax plan that was even FAIRER than the flat tax the GOP proposes.

And certainly, something is needed. Every day, dozens of multi-millionaires are giving all their money away and taking up part-time minimum wage jobs just so they can take advantage of what the Wall Street Journal calls "The Lucky Ducky Rate"

You see, according the to Bureau of Labor Statistics, (http://www.bls.gov/opub/ils/pdf/opbils48.pdf) the average income before taxes in the US in 2002 was $44,649. That’s per consumer unit, mind you, and if you don’t know what a consumer unit is, then you just aren’t watching enough television. Average expenses are $38,045,and since only 1% of income in America goes to savings, it’s safe to assume the rest goes to taxes.

Republicans assure us that the rich that all us commies want to victimize are anyone making over $40,000 a year, and the rich already pay 39% of their income in taxes. Therefore, it’s safe to assume that all Americans are embezzling and selling drugs on the side.

Actually, the tax burden is probably more than the $6,000 or so left after expenditures and savings, and closer to $8,000, because we’re adding, on average, about $2,000 a year in debt. So figure, from that, a flat tax of 18%. (Corporations don’t pay, of course, because corporations don’t owe America anything).

Everybody pays 18%. That’s fair, right?

Now, suppose we extend that out a little bit.

Housing, for example. The average consumer unit spends 32.4 of its income on housing. But in reality, there is a huge discrepancy. Some guy making minimum wage has it easy, only paying $1,250 a month for a one bedroom apartment in Los Angeles. But a guy like Ken Lay, he’s got to keep up appearances, so he’s making payments (or was before that unfortunate misunderstanding about stealing tens of billions from the public) on seventeen mansions. Why, I wouldn’t be in the least bit surprised if he was paying 35, even 40% of his income for housing!

You see the problem.

So if we adopt what I call the flat housing rate. It’s simplicity itself.

Where ever you live, your housing costs will be 32.4% of your income. Since, obviously, an eighteen room mansion on 1,200 acres of impeccably manicured grounds with pools and tennis courts and a movie theater would entail somewhat higher maintenance costs than a single-wide out in the woods might, the best thing to do is randomize who gets to live where, so the rich have the same opportunity for lower impact housing as the poor currently enjoy.

Same goes for food. The rich have a terrible burden, spending immense amounts on such things as the finest Belgian chocolate, imported bottled water, wines from the finest vintners, and only the freshest and tastiest meats, fruits and vegetables. Compare with the privileged minimum wage earner, whose only effort is to stop by the local mickey deez and lay out a buck ninety nine for a Happy Meal. How unjust can you get?

Food is 13.6% of a consumer unit’s budget. Everyone pays in 13.6 percent, and they get a year’s supply of food, again randomized since the higher quality foods have higher storage and preparation costs involved, and we don’t want the wealthy to suffer unduly. One day you might get truffles, the next, a hamburger. What could possibly be fairer?

Here’s the rest of the average expenditures. If I might be so bold, this would be a good exercise in math for the kids, who could have fun comparing the percentages of income they presently spend with the immense savings that my exciting new plan will offer. Alcoholic beverages 1.0; Apparel and services 4.9; Transportation 19.5; Health care 5.4;

Entertainment 4.9; Personal care products and services 1.5; Reading 4; Education 1.7; Tobacco products and smoking supplies 8; Miscellaneous 2.0; Cash contributions 3.1; Personal insurance and pensions 8.8.

Another plus; since everyone will be donating 3.1% in cash contributions (an expense that is particularly onerous on the rich right now, since buying an entire Congress AND the White House costs nearly half a billion dollars!), the money can simply be divvied out evenly among all political parties, charities, and churches. Fairness exemplified!

Of course, the big savings will come when you do your income taxes. You just write how much you made, and then send it in, and shortly, your friendly mailman will bring to you vouchers for your mortgage payments, clothes, school (and the wealthy will be very happy to finally have those school vouchers!) and alcohol and everything else.

The alternative, of course, is progressive taxes, leading inevitably to socialism. Obviously, my plan would avoid that.

You’ll have to excuse me now. I expect calls from Warren Buffet and Al Laffer any time now, expressing their consternation that they didn’t think of this "flat life" plan first.

What can I say? It takes a rare combination of modesty and genius. No need to thank me. Watching the smiles of joy on the faces of the downtrodden rich will be reward enough!