A Flat Tax
Steve Forbes presents his framework for a flat tax in the US. Did you know that a flat tax has been implemented in the past 10 years in Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Russia, Ukraine, Slovakia, Romania, Georgia, and Serbia? And it's become a mainstream political issue in Greece and Poland? In Estonia it worked so well that they've paid off their national debt and going to lower the flat tax in 2007. I love this part of Forbes' plan: "To avoid puerile and divisive debate about who would gain and who would lose, my flat tax is designed to be a tax cut for all. Because some people will only focus on what they lose in the way of deductions under the flat tax--ignoring the fact that their income tax payments would go down--my plan gives you a choice: When the flat tax is implemented, you can file your postcard return under this new, simple system, or continue to file your tax returns, with all of their mind-numbing complexity, under the old system. See for yourself which is better. I think most would conclude that the flat tax is best." What a choice! I think the old system would disappear instantly if it were presented in this democratic way. Or how about this as an add-on to the plan: people would pay a surcharge equal to their share of the cost of processing their taxes. Those choosing the old system would pay for the cost of processing via the existing IRS, those choosing the Flat Tax would pay a considerably lower surcharge. The biggest problem with this plan is the messenger: it just won't work to have Steve Forbes, capitalist mascot and billionaire, pitching this kind of plan.