A VAT alone is simply a national sales tax. How cool would that be? VAT on top of everything else, and well, you get France.
I have read that the US spends more on military items than all the rest of the world combined. I wonder if that is true. I wonder if we really need 6000 nuclear warheads! There are two relatively easy things that need to be done in the US, but neither is likely to be done because too many powerful and wealthy individuals will make less money if they are accomplished. The first is to break the power of the medical cartel by deregulating medicine and opening it up to competition. This can cut medical care costs in half and bring them into line with other developed nations. The second is to reduce military spending by at least 50%. Evenso, the U.S. would still have the most powerful military in the world. Don't hold your breadth waiting for these things to happen though. As a bonus for Every U.S. citizen, we could just throw the entire IRS code out the window and replace it with a national VAT, with rents, mortgages, food and energy below threshold levels exempted. .
Elect democrats, get more taxes. Remember that when they tricked voters into approving a constitutional amendment to allow the federal income tax, voters were assured it would never be more than 3 or 4 %. Same with VAT. It will be at least 15 or 20% in no time, no matter what the initial rate. I wonder if vaseline will be deductible?
How bout we let the country default and redo everything but next time around include a balanced budget amendment, backing the currency with gold, etc....... It's just easier to let it all burn and start over than finding new fixes. And wow, I've had no tv and little internet access over the past few weeks but the 10 year is at 3.70%. 2-10 and 2-30 spreads are mighty wide.
I never thought I'd be ASHAMED to be a registered Democrat, but now I am. First we have Republican FACSISTS...now we have Democratic SOCIALISTS... All told, facism is of course, worse; but Obama's reckless spending will cripple our currency, stock markets, or both.
you have my vote for that, but military first. hey..that's not all.. http://www.energybulletin.net/node/13199 how about that?
Tough shit. The income taxes are invasional to say the least. How is it Mr. Public Sector's business how much I make or how much I spent on anything or donated? It might be a step towards elimination of that garbage. The transition could be difficult but the current situation of jobless recoveries and continually reduced revenues for the debt laden public sector is untenable to say the least. Democrats are against VAT and demonize it as "regressive". Tough shit. What it would do is give everybody a jolting reminder of the cost of government every time they bought something. Democrats are in total denial about the cost of government, they just want it bigger... It's the only tax that EVERY FRIGGINBODY pays, tourists, illegals and criminals of all kinds, the wealthy.. it brings the underground economy into taxation, hookers rent motel rooms, drug dealers eat in restaurants and buy cars and rent apartments, mob guys buy houses and toys, illegals buy food and pay rents, they all would be taxed for once... There would be incentive to legalize drugs and tax them and we could have our fourth amendment back at that point as well as the tax revenue from that part of the economy. Living in denial that there is a big underground economy and wasting a lot of talent and money trying to regulate it is nuts, it's truly insane, and setting aside constitutional rights in order to do something that is arguably nuts is really insane... Other than Socialist Idealism, which has gotten nobody on the planet anywhere yet, in all of history, [with the exception of people that want complete control over populations] there is no reason to be against VAT in the US.
When Democrats say tax cut they really mean that the rate of increase will slow down.. temporarily...
We can see it happening on a smaller scale in California. Politicians cannot stop spending. They run on doing this or that for constituants then need more money to do it. NEVER do they cut a project - unless it is for our self defense. Look at Obama's trillion dollar budget (pork) after a near trillion dollar stimulus (pork) after a 600 Billion Omnibus Bill (more pork). Then the Big O says he's asked his cabinet to cut $100 million! That's nothing. He should have been run out of town on a rail after even pretending that was meaningful. I'm not going to go for a federal sales tax unless they get rid of the income tax. I'll revolt!! Are you guys with me?