by | ARTICLES, BLOG, ELECTIONS, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, LAW, POLITICS, TAXES
Taxpayers have been long bamboozled into making generous commitments to the retirement systems of public service workers. All over the country, in all levels of federal and state governments, these defined benefit plan pension plans have proven to be vastly untenable. To sustain the plans in their current arrangements and cover the obligations that have already been promised, the rest of society will be compelled to contribute to the retirement of those public service workers via higher taxes. This is turn makes the rest of the populace poorer — because their hard-earned money is being levied to the promised public pensioner, and not available to be saved for themselves.
The grand scheme is becoming unhinged. One must realize that the more people continue to buy into the idea that they are supposed to “retire at 65”, the more they are suckered into continuing to make their retirement years poorer and subsequently make the retirement years of public service employees richer. People see a public service worker being able to retire at that age and they think, “I should be able to also do so”. This idea needs to change.
There are two reasons why most people think that such pension programs are still sustainable and normal: 1) the exorbitant pension costs are buried in the category of “education costs” which allow advocates to falsely argue that higher education costs mean better education, and 2)the costs are largely buried in the larger budget process of federal/state/local governments (and how many people pay attention?).
In the private sector, costs are held in check by the fact that out-of-control costs make the overall cost of the product too high in the marketplace, and will bring the company down. The employees negotiate with company officials who are responsible to a board of directors and shareholders who need to provide a competitive product. But in the public sector, with no competition, costs become whatever the public sector unions can squeeze out of the elected officials who they have helped elect, and who are more accountable to them than to the taxpayers who pay the bill.
The costs to keep public employee pension plans afloat are borne by all the rest of society — the taxpayers. This arrangement enables a small group of people to be paid a sizeable and continuous pension until death. It is not out of the ordinary anymore for a person to receive $65K- $100K for the rest of his or her life. But the actuarial cost to provide that promised benefit is astronomical, and unfair to hard-working private sector employees.
by | BLOG, FREEDOM, RETIREMENT, SOCIAL SECURITY, TAXES
Everyone thinks he can retire at age 65. It’s an American ideal born in the last century with the rise of unions, the defined benefit plan, and generous pension systems. In reality — especially due to advances in health, medicine, and nutrition — many people have great capability to continue to work and contribute to society and themselves until 70-80. And they should, because they need to.
There is a crisis of affordability looming. Besides the enormously wealthy, for the most part no average person can afford to retire at 65. It is simply not possible, living a normal lifestyle, for anyone to put enough toward retirement by age 65 that will enable him to be supported for another 20-30 years. A life span of 85-95 is swiftly becoming the new norm. The only workers today who are the exception to this reality, and have any hope of a lengthy retirement with comfort, are public service employees. (That point is addressed in a subsequent piece entitled, “Abuse to the Taxpayer by Public Service Employees.”)
With the lifespan of Americans growing longer, retiring at 65 is no longer viable; the systems are badly strained. And it is certainly not rational for the longevity of Social Security and Medicare either. Yet the steadfast refusal of most of government to overhaul retirement systems or make age and formula adjustments to entitlement programs — in order to maintain this retirement facade — only compounds the problem.
Another one of the biggest detriments of being able to retire at 65 is investment return. Interest rates have been historically low for the last six years and there is a strong likelihood of them staying low for some time. As a result, people’s retirement portfolios have lagged in their anticipated growth and goals. The low rates mean less money overall for retirement time, a problem which can be offset by continuing to work and contribute to a retirement fund past the basic age.
Likewise, inflation is not the issue that everyone thinks it is. The true problem is the cost of living — but really, it’s the cost of modern living, the “keeping up with the Jones’s”. The cost of aspirin, color TV’s, computers, and long distance calls are NOT going up. But people now can have Celebrex instead of aspirin, surround-sound with flat screens instead of color TV, and smart phones instead of computers and standard phones. Newer models of everything due to technology is constantly changing — upgrading quality of life, but at an increased cost.
In sum, with living longer, low rates of return, and the “cost of Jones’s increase”, people must begin to realize that the time span between 65 – 75 can be, and should be, a healthy and productive time of life. Working, staying active, and continuing to save will be beneficial in the long run. The mindset of older citizens needs to change and they need to understand that they can should aim to be productive until they are 75. At 65 they can certainly slow down, but the concept of retiring and not working anymore at that age is unrealistic and unaffordable.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, IRS, LAW, TAXES
We need to eliminate the AMT from the tax code entirely. Here’s why:
The Alternative Minimum Tax (“AMT”) presents hardships to the practitioner as well as the taxpayer who prepares his own return by, as its name implies, imposing a second tax calculation mechanism on taxpayers. It serves virtually no useful purpose, other than the raising of an ever-increasing amount of tax revenue. But it has become very clear in recent years that this AMT tax revenue is not coming from just the taxpayers who were the intended targets of this tax.
The AMT was instituted in its present form when the prior “add on” Minimum Tax was transformed into the AMT in the early 1980’s. Its stated purpose was to require that all taxpayers paid at least a fair share of tax. It was to do this by identifying “loophole” type deductions, also known as “preferences”. There would then be an alternative calculation using lower tax rates applied against this taxable income as increased by the preferences. Whichever of the taxes is higher is the one the taxpayer must pay.
However the AMT was seriously flawed from the outset. Instead of focusing on these loophole type preferences (which would have limited the tax to a very small number of tax law “abusers”), the law that was passed included items that were not loopholes at all. A convoluted formula compares the differences between income and deductions to determine who falls under the guidelines.
A very substantial majority of all AMT paid by taxpayers results from the following four factors:
- Treating state and local taxes as a preference
- Treating miscellaneous deductions as a preference
- Allowing lower exemptions than the regular tax.
Each of these, however, can be quickly shown as inappropriate factors with which to base a tax system intended to just make sure everyone pays a “fair share” of tax.
- State and local taxes are hardly a loophole. The taxes exacted by state and local governments are hardly “voluntarily” paid by taxpayers in an attempt to avoid paying federal taxes.
- Miscellaneous deductions is the category of deductions that consists primarily of expenses incurred to earn income that is subject to tax. It includes unreimbursed employee expenses, investment expenses, etc. This is the most basic and important deduction needed to have a truly fair income tax system. For example, if an individual pays a lawyer a fee for collecting back wages, the legal fee is a miscellaneous deduction. If an individual pays the lawyer $300 for collecting $1000 of back pay, netting $700, the AMT would tax the individual on the full $1000.
- The exemption available under the AMT tax system is a fixed dollar amount which, unlike exemptions and standard deductions under the regular tax system, is not indexed for inflation. Furthermore, it is phased out entirely over certain income levels. And each year Congress has to approve an annual “patch”, which raises the threshold for inflation, in order to raise the exemption limits of the tax so that less wealthy taxpayers won’t be subject to the AMT.
The AMT in its present form has no place in tax law. The AMT does not serve the purpose for which it was intended and functions in a most inequitable manner while adding enormous compliance burdens. It should therefore be changed to eliminate the adjustments for state and local taxes and miscellaneous deductions, update its rates, and modify its exemption — or else the AMT needs to be eliminated completely.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, GOVERNMENT, IRS, LAW, POLITICS, TAXES
The Democrats have continuously claimed that they are looking out for America’s middle class by keeping the tax rates the same for them while seeking to raise rates on the wealthiest Americans who need to “pay their fair share”. This assertions serves to deflect attention away from the one policy that is already the mechanism for ensuring that the wealthiest pay more. What is it? The AMT.
The Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) currently serves virtually no useful purpose, other than the raising of an ever-increasing amount of tax revenue. The AMT was instituted in its present form when the prior “add on” Minimum Tax was transformed into the AMT in the early 1980’s. Its stated purpose was to require that all taxpayers paid at least a “fair share of tax”. Yet it has become very clear in recent years that this AMT tax revenue is not coming from just the taxpayers who were the intended targets of this tax.
The AMT was developed to identify “loophole” type deductions, also known as “preferences”. There would then be an alternative calculation using lower tax rates applied against this taxable income as increased by the preferences. Whichever of the taxes is higher is the one the taxpayer must pay.
However the AMT was seriously flawed from the outset. Instead of focusing on these loophole type preferences (which would have limited the tax to a very small number of tax law abusers), the law that was passed included items that were not loopholes at all. A convoluted formula is used to calculate and compare the differences between income and deductions in order to determine who falls under the guidelines. Interestingly, a very substantial majority of all current AMT paid by taxpayers results from the following factors: 1) treating state and local taxes as a preference; 2) treating miscellaneous deductions as a preference; 3) allowing lower exemptions than the regular tax.
These factors have flaws. For instance, state and local taxes are hardly a loophole because taxes exacted by state and local governments are hardly “voluntarily” paid by taxpayers in an attempt to avoid paying federal taxes. Likewise, “Miscellaneous Deductions” is the category of deductions that consists primarily of expenses incurred to earn income. It often includes unreimbursed employee expenses, investment expenses, etc. This is the most basic and important deduction necessary to have a truly fair income tax system and should not be considered a loophole. Furthermore, the exemption available under the AMT is a fixed dollar amount which, unlike exemptions and standard deductions under the regular tax system, is not indexed for inflation; it is also phased out entirely over certain income levels.
During AMT discussions over the years, Congress used to posture and point to the AMT patch as some major revenue loss (had the AMT been applied to those families) as an excuse to raise to raise taxes in order to offset this “potential missing tax revenue”. Once the “patch” became permanent and the higher exemption level kept many taxpayers from being hit with the AMT, Congress stopped talking about the AMT altogether. But the fact still remains that there is a parallel tax system already that goes after the highest income-earners; they already pay “their fair share” — and then some
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, ECONOMY, FREEDOM, LAW, RETIREMENT, SOCIAL SECURITY
Entitlement reform is necessary for the fiscal health of this country, but it is something that no one wants to talk about, much less tackle. How can we begin? How can we open up the conversation and the possibility to reform and improve our social security system?
One step in the right direction would be to treat Social Security as a true retirement plan, and not as a wealth transfer system that it currently is. This could begin with reclassifying the payroll tax. The majority (6.2% out of 7.65%) of the payroll tax covers Social Security retirement benefits. If we actually used it (or at least most of it) for that individual’s social security retirement, everyone’s perception would change. Instead of being viewed as a hated tax (just ask any young person who has received their first paycheck), it would be viewed as a desirable saving for their future!
Let’s make another incremental change. The employer and employee contribute equally to the Social Security Tax. If the individual’s part went towards his personal retirement, the other part could go towards defraying the past obligations that are coming due. If we had done such a thing 20 years ago, the entire system would have been fixed. Unfortunately, the present situation would probably require some portion of the individual’s portion to also go towards paying the ever growing obligation for past unfunded promises. It’s that dire! And every year that we do not fix it, it gets worse.
We must stop treating Social Security like welfare or wealth transfers and start treating it like a retirement system. It’s our money anyway, even though the government wants to act like it is being generous when it gives us back our money. This would lessen the loose-and-fast accounting gimmicks that contribute to the fiscal mismanagement of Social Security anyway — and may move it away from its impending insolvency.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, FREEDOM, IRS, LAW, RETIREMENT, SOCIAL SECURITY, TAXES
Whenever tax reform, tax packages, or tax changes get discussed and debated, the focus is always on “the middle class.” While this sounds noble, the reality is that the middle class already pays very little in taxes. The majority of the middle class “tax bill” is actually Social Security — which is not truly a tax.
For example, my son made about $35,000 last year. He paid $1,500 in income tax and $4,500 in Social Security. But contributions to the Social Security system should not be viewed as a tax — it is effectively a forced retirement payment. Pundits and lawmakers need to stop calling Social Security payments a tax, and need to stop including Social Security payments in their tax equations because it does not operate as a tax.
I strongly believe that with some tweaks to the Social Security system that make the benefits more tied to contributions and allow for some ownership of the underlying assets, we can get people to view those payments in a positive light – investing for their future. When you remove the Social Security line item from the amount of tax liability, you see that the lower and middle classes have a very low income tax liability.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, LAW, OBAMA, OBAMACARE, POLITICS, TAXES
I’m sick and tired of reading over and over again in places both liberal and conservative that Trump’s (as well as the Republican’s) proposed tax reforms are going to give the lion’s share of the cuts to the top 1%. The entire concept is totally distorted.
In fact, nobody has been talking about the series of tax changes that occurred when Obama and his Democrat cronies passed the Obamacare increases. These raised the Bush tax rates on only the wealthiest from 36% – 39.6 % and then again raised the tax rates on the wealthiest by adding a net investment income tax (NIIT), otherwise known as the “Obamacare tax,” which covered all investment income. The increase also raised capital gains tax on the wealthiest from 15% – 20%. When the 3.8% tax is added, capital gains rates effectively went from 15%- 23.8% — an increase of almost 60%. That’s ridiculous!
Those ludicrous tax increases were principally responsible — along with the hemorrhage of regulations coming out of the Obama administration — for the horrific economic performance since Obama took office. The first step of any meaningful tax reform should be to reverse those Obamacare tax increases, which went 100% to the higher income individuals, and 0% to the middle class and lower income. The reversal of those insane tax increases should in no way be considered a tax cut. It is just restoring what was in fact an egregious toxin on our entire economy.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, POLITICS
The appointment of Former F.B.I Director Robert Mueller as Special Counsel for the Trump-Russia investigation seemed like a decent choice for the task. I had only heard good things about Mueller and looked forward to getting to the bottom of whether or not there were actual, illegal ties between Trump’s campaign and Russian officials. Unfortunately, by one single action, Robert Mueller has now revealed himself as a person unfit to be special counsel. This action was his selection of Andrew Weissmann as a key advisor in the investigation. Mueller has simply discarded his integrity. Andrew Weissmann is an outrageous, criminal human being.
Robert Mueller knows full well that Andrew Weissmann should be jailed for misconduct, or at the very least, disbarred. The one job that Weissmann should never again have is that of prosecutor. There are two very well-known, high-profile court cases I will briefly overview which will show Weissmann’s lack of any moral compass and highly unethical legal practices.
The first example is the famous Arthur Andersen case. The list of egregious behaviors by Weissmann runs long:
In an effort to make a name for himself, Andrew Weissmann brought an indictment against the Arthur Andersen firm as an entity, instead of only against the partner that allegedly committed a crime. No indictment against a company for the action of one person had never been done before — or ever since. This is especially important because Weissmann knew, that in the context of a “Big 4 CPA firm,” bringing an indictment — even if no conviction were ever accomplished — would automatically and completely destroy the firm and all of its employees, which is exactly what happened.
Once he issued forth the indictment, he used malicious and unorthodox methods to pursue his case, including threatening indictment of numerous individuals if they testified for the defense, intentionally distorting the “crimes” that Arthur Andersen allegedly committed, and refusing to allow Arthur Andersen tell their side of the story to the Grand Jury.
If that wasn’t enough, Weissmann lambasted Arthur Andersen in court for legally shredding documents, which they – in accordance with their firm’s existing policy and existing law — had no obligation whatsoever to retain. Most outrageously, Weissmann made changes to the definition of the “crime” and its level of criminal culpability (intent) in the jury instructions. With all these procedures, Weissmann strongly urged — and convinced the jury — to find Arthur Andersen guilty – even if the firm had no knowledge that its members had done anything wrong.
What’s worse is that in the end, no crime was actually ever committed, as determined later by a unanimous 9-0 Supreme Court decision. At oral argument, the Court viciously ridiculed the theory that Weissmann used in order to charge the crime in the first place. Unfortunately, that exoneration came too late: Weissmann had destroyed an 89 year-old accounting institution and eliminated 85,000 jobs by distorting the law, denying the defendants a fair trial, and taking intent out of the jury instructions, all for no purpose whatsoever, except possible personal gain and fame.
The second case high-profile case, involving Jim Brown of Merrill Lynch (also related to Weissmann’s position on the Enron task force), is equally appalling:
Andrew Weissmann persecuted and prosecuted Jim Brown, a Merrill-Lynch executive, for a deal with Enron which Weissmann argued in court was a bogus deal. The problem is that Jim Brown never extracted a deal at all; he opposed it and was not a privy to it. The deal in question involved a solicitation from Merrill-Lynch to provide $7 million cash for minority holdings in a company that electrical power barges near Nigeria; Enron held the majority interest. The crime in question was the allegation that Enron had agreed to buy the barges back later, thereby making its accounting as a gain from its sale to Merrill-Lynch wrong. Weissmann alleged that since Jim Brown was one of four Merrill-Lynch executives, he was a culpable party.
Much of the case hinged on a phone call where the deal was discussed — a phone call that Jim Brown wasn’t actually on. Weissmann met with Brown voluntarily to hear his opinion of the telephone call, and despite hearing the exculpatory explanation, Weissmann nevertheless had Brown indicted for perjury and obstruction of justice. Weissmann later produced an email that mentioned the phone call, written by Brown in a different context and a year after the phone call in question, then urged the judge to prevent any evidence that would explain the email’s actual meaning.
Based upon the above facts, there is no way anyone could think Jim Brown could be accused of a crime. So, in order to win that case, Weissmann (1) concocted evidence; (2) terrorized anyone that would come forth to support Jim Brown’s position; and (3) threatened prosecuting individuals who would testify for Jim Brown. More outrageously, Weissmann also hid Brady material (evidence known by Weissmann that would be important to the defense and which by law Weissmann was required to turn over); he then repeatedly lied to the court about having such material. In a truly incredible incident, a document was discovered in which Weissmann highlighted in yellow magic marker evidence that would have gone a long way to proving Jim Brown’s innocence — at the same time he was telling the court that he had no such evidence!
The atrocities don’t end there. In another example, Katherine Zrike, a key individual in the Brown transaction, virtually exonerated Brown in her testimony under oath to the Grand Jury. Weissmann hid this information from the defense (a clear Brady violation) and subsequently lied to the Court about having relevant information. Jim Brown was ultimately found guilty of fraud, conspiracy, perjury, and obstruction and sent to prison. The fraud and conspiracy charges were later overturned.
On October 26, 2011, six years after the Arthur Andersen case was decided and less than two years after the Jim Brown debacle concluded, Robert Mueller announced the appointment of Andrew Weissmann as FBI General Counsel and Deputy Director under Mueller’s watch. What’s more, in 2015, the same Weissmann moved to the criminal fraud section at Department of Justice. And now, Weissmann is a part of Mueller’s special counsel team investigating allegations of collusion between Trump’s campaign and Russia. This truly is the story of the fox -with blood on his lips – guarding the henhouse!
The current Trump-Russia investigation requires evenhanded, impartiality, and integrity. It’s as important as any special counsel in history. That fact that Mueller would even consider someone with such a heinous, tainted history as Andrew Weissmann to work on his team shows incredibly poor judgment. It is absolutely imperative that Robert Mueller resign now.
