The 35G individual has available to him and utilizes a multitude of government services from welfare on up, services the 35M will never even consider using. Even on the most basic level, how much local police protection is the 35M going to use. The 35G is going to rely on that protection daily. Does the 35M send his children to public school? Does the 35M fill out a fed FAFSA form for his children's college scholarship?
Does the government help make it all but impossible for the 35K guy's employees to unionize? Does the government impose tariffs and such to help the 35K guy keep his prices high? Does the government dish out multi-billion dollar contracts to the 35K guy before, during, and after wars? Does the government allow the 35K guy to write off his Jet so he won't have to fly with the peons? Does the government Actively promote the 35K guy's products and services overseas? Does the government give the 35K guy sweetheart cost plus jobs to build missile defense systems that can never be really tested, or contracts to build court houses and the like? Does the government provide the 35K guy with data, statistics, and other information, free of charge to help him make business decisions? Does the government provide countless billions to defray the cost of educating and training employees for the 35K guy? BTW - you mentioned welfare, something the 35K guy is not entitled to, but who ends up with the welfare money? Not too many poor folks own apartment buildings, food stores, clothing manufacturing plants, or utility companies. Now would you like to rethink your answer?
You're comparing the 35G to a 35M owner of a company that relies on government contracts, owns a corporate jet, sells missle defense systems and/or local gov't construction, utilizes gov't data, and apparently also relies on gov't subsistence to educate its employees. Now, do you think that Oprah (100+ million income) or Helen Walton or siblings (net worth,16.5 billion each) and many more, really gives a crap about all that?
The users got to live in the apartment, eat the food, wear the clothes and power his 25" TV set. They obviously got the most use out of that money. And they got 100% of the use, the manufacturer and/or provider will only see a small fraction of that revenue.
The heat in Florida is getting to you. The 35g dude and the 35mm chap should derive equal benefits from the government. Neither should get more even though with a flat tax the 35mm pays more. Explain why under your theories we should redistribute money from the rich to the poor. Granted a rich person should contribute to charity to help those less fortunate, but the government making that decision for him is contrary to the basis on which our economic and social contracts have been so successful. (Not perfect, just more successful than anywhere else in this world.) BTW, it is those very lucrative government contracts that allow the corporations to hire the workers to build the overpriced items. It IS just a disguised form of welfare. Grab a mitt and get in the game!
But we already have that distribution scheme. Most of the income tax is paid by the wealthiest, thereby benefitting the poor and the middle classes.
I stand corrected and agree, they should have the equal opportunity to derive the benefit not necessarily have the same benefit. The problem with people like Tampa is that they want to force equality in outcomes, not equality in opportunity.
Not only is the tax code screwed up, the penalties for making errors way too severe. Does it make sense for someone who makes a small mistake on their tax filings to potentially face a long prison sentence? There's nobody on the planet that knows every detail in the tax code that includes the IRS and accountants. Why do they make such stiff penalties to scare people? It's inevitable that people with complicated tax situation will make some mistakes. It's like we're living under a dictator when it comes to filing taxes. People should get awards for just trying to figure out the confusing tax code.