Wrong Allocation of Resources
SeDmi
In an article in the August 10, 2023 Wall Street Journal, former Senator Phill Gramm and Jodey Arrington discuss how the Biden administration wrongfully allocated money to the IRS, and how they have made practically no effort to recover money stolen during the pandemic.
Here are some of the points made in the article:
- Criminals stole at least $1 trillion from taxpayers during the pandemic. To date the Biden administration has offered only lip service and modest funding to try to reclaim these funds and punish the thieves.
- Meanwhile President Biden is hiring an army of new Internal Revenue Service agents to shake down Americans he claims are tax evaders. And his commitment is substantial—$80 billion to hire 87,000 new IRS agents.
- According to Congressional Budget Office estimates, all that extra manpower and money will net the federal government only about $100 billion in increased revenue collection.
- The House Ways and Means Committee estimates that fraudulent payments made under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program alone could be as high as $400 billion, only $5 billion of which has been recovered. Almost all the crooks who stole taxpayer money are getting away with it.
- Note that in 2022 alone, the IRS itself made an estimated $25.4 billion in improper payments in only three programs: earned-income tax credits, additional child tax credits and American opportunity tax credits. The GAO estimates that the level of improper payments by the IRS in these programs runs as high as 28% of all payments made.
- Yet none of the $80 billion in new IRS funding is specifically earmarked to deal with fraud in the welfare programs funded with tax credits and administered by the IRS.
- Despite the administration’s claim, the new IRS enforcement revenues flowing from its $80 billion surge in funding will come primarily from middle and upper-middle income Americans. The Joint Committee on Taxation estimates that 78% to 90% of the money extracted from underreported income would come from those making less than $200,000 a year. Only 4% to 9% would come from those making more than $500,000 a year.
- A Senate Finance Committee analysis shows the new IRS enforcement spending would “predominantly hit taxpayers who have low (or very low) Adjusted Gross Income.” Nearly half of the audits would hit Americans making $75,000 a year or less.
- If the government was serious about being fair to taxpayers and deterring future fraud, they would aggressively hunt down swindlers, recoup fraudulent payments, hold criminals accountable, and implement safeguards such as an identity and eligibility verification systems.
- Congress has a choice: Harass honest taxpayers or track down the crooks who stole their money.
CONCLUSION
The most interesting point made in this article is how it shows what the D.C. Elites and their minions in Congress consider important.
They allocate $80 billion to the IRS which is expected to yield a net of $100 billion in additional collections over ten years. Since the people evading taxes don’t identify themselves as evaders, there will need to be at least five to ten harassing audits of American taxpayers who tried to lawfully report their income to possibly find one cheater.
However, they make no attempt to pursue real criminals who have stolen at least $1 trillion of the money designated for pandemic relief to honest American businesses. That tells you a lot about their priorities.
All of us agree that people should report their income and calculate their taxes honestly. We know that the evasion rate for the income/payroll tax system is at least $1 trillion per year. If this $1 trillion was collected, that’s $1 trillion we wouldn’t have to borrow to support current spending levels.
However, doesn’t it make more sense to recover the $1 trillion in stolen pandemic funds and not just “harass American taxpayers” to maybe collect $100 billion?
What possible reason could there be for this irrational decision making by the D.C. Elites and their minions? It is because they want to protect the income/payroll tax system.
They want to protect what has become a lucrative source of money and power for them. The income/payroll tax system allows politicians to rake in multiplied millions of dollars from lobbyists seeking to buy favorable tax treatment for their clients.
The ability to hand out tax breaks to some and tax penalties to others gives them the ability to control people’s behavior, and also to reward their friends and punish their opponents.
It’s this insatiable desire for money and power that fuels the DC elites’ adamant opposition to the FAIRtax. They see the real threat that the FAIRtax is to their income source and their ability to control us.
The Members of Congress that care about us don’t have to look far for an alternative to the present income/payroll tax system that abolishes the need for the IRS. It is H.R. 25, the FAIRtax.
The FAIRtax transfers power from the government and bureaucrats to the people. We, not the bureaucrats and D.C., decide how much tax we pay.
Congress and D.C. know that there is a better alternative to the present system—the FAIRtax.
Instead of spending time and money doing endless hours of paperwork that don’t create anything of value to yourself, your family or the nation, why not eliminate the unnecessary waste?
Isn’t it time to end this ludicrous tax collection system and the IRS?
When the FAIRtax is enacted, there will be no need to fear being audited by the IRS or raided by armed IRS agents because there will be no more IRS.
There is going to be a vote on the FAIRtax in the House of Representatives. McCarthy and the other elites didn’t want it, but it was forced on them.
We now have the opportunity to force all Members of the House to show where they stand. They can:
- Vote for the present income/payroll tax system or for the FAIRtax.
- Support the corrupt income tax and the IRS or eliminate it. It can’t be any simpler than that.
- Hide the true cost of their government or pass the FAIRtax and show everyone the true cost of government on each retail receipt.
- Support the largest transfer of power from government to the people, the FAIRtax, or not.
Please stand with us and demand that your representative support a much fairer, much simpler and much more efficient way to fund the government—the FAIRtax!
The FAIRtax doesn’t pick winners and losers. Because it taxes spending, not earnings, the FAIRtax lets everyone save for their retirement tax free.
The FAIRtax will allow us to TAKE BACK CONTROL.
The income/payroll tax system is broken and no longer working—we can’t repair it but we can replace it with the FAIRTAX!
Join us and TAKE BACK CONTROL OF OUR COUNTRY AND OUR LIVES—NOT WITH BULLETS BUT WITH THE ELIMINATION OF ONE OF THE BIGGEST THREATS TO OUR LIBERTY AND ECONOMIC PROSPERITY—THE INCOME/PAYROLL TAX.
We all should remember Edmund Burke’s warning that applies to our efforts to TAKE BACK CONTROL,
“Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.”
We should also remember this quote from George Orwell's 1984, which, if we do nothing, may foretell your and your children's future:
“If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face—forever.”
WHAT CAN EACH OF US DO?
We can write letters and make calls to our elected representatives and attend Zoom town hall meetings demanding that if they really want to allow Americans to “TAKE BACK CONTROL”, the first step is to eliminate the income/payroll tax system and enact the FAIRTAX!
TAKE BACK CONTROL! Help us PASS THE FAIRTAX!
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