Kerry on the proposed National Sales Tax: "Every day will be April 15"

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

PLEASE NOTE when you are reading the article below that the the DISPUTED NUMBERS are for the SALES TAX ONLY...your STATE SALES TAX will remain as it is and the National Sales Tax would be added to it. So, In California, I pay 8.25%. If the "worst case scenario" below happened...50%...it would be 50% PLUS 8.25%...58.25%...on EVERYTHING I purchased.

What you won't find in the article are the various proposals to have this "National Sales Tax" applied to service such as your visits to the doctor, which you won't be able to afford anyway once Bush convinces your employer to stop giving you benefits.

Regarding the worry over "the effect of a national sales tax on consumer activity"...I think the effect will be pretty clear, don't you?

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,131693,00.html

Responding to a question at a Florida campaign rally last month, Bush sounded open to discussion of a national sales tax. "I'm not exactly sure how big the national sales tax is going to have to be, but it's kind of an interesting idea that we ought to explore seriously," the president said. The next day administration officials said Bush was not considering such a reform.

John Kerry's campaign quickly condemned a national sales tax, and Bush for potentially supporting it. “If has his way, every trip to the supermarket will feel like a visit to H&R Block and every day will be April 15. And now that this plan has been exposed, George W. Bush is trying to mislead the public into thinking it was just an off-the-cuff comment," Kerry spokesman Phil Singer said in an Aug. 12 statement.

Linder said he is unsure how the proposal would be received in the administration. "There is a battle going on in the administration between those who think he should jump into this and those who are afraid of big ideas," he said.

But while some think the system sounds good, critics dispute Linder's expected tax rate of 23 percent. William Gale, an economic expert at the Brookings Institution (search), estimated that to replace the income tax, the sales tax rate would have to be more than 26 percent. Other economists place the number at 40 or 50 percent. Adding to this chorus, Weinstein suggested that 30 to 36 percent would be more realistic, and said he worried about the effect of a national sales tax on consumer activity. "A considerably high tax may dampen consumption. Quite frankly we got out of the last recession through consumer spending," he said.

[Deja Q]

1. Cool. More shifting of the cost from the wealthy to the poor.

If they want to kill us off, let them be compassionate about it and send us cyanide pills in the mail.

[Carni]

2. Yeah but do you realize how much graft they get from corp cronies?

Is graft a word? LOL (I am hoping it's the word I was looking for)

But seriously they get so much free stuff what will they care!

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

3. One other angle I forgot to put in my post...

...employers will have an EXCUSE for paying LESS, because they will say:

"Well, you're not paying income tax any more, so this is MORE than you would have been making if you WERE."

Lower wages will slow the bleeding of jobs to India, Bush will take credit for "bringin' the jobs back home for every 'murcan who wants one.:

:puke:

[okieinpain]

5. who say's that would stop them from sending jobs out of country

the only reason there are jobs here is because the company can't afford to send the work out.

[Carni]

8. On edit (but it's too late to edit)

I misread your post (How dumb can I be? Pretty dumb apparently!)

I agree cyanide would be at least quicker and less painful--

If I have to start paying 40% on everything I buy, I may as well just make a dwelling in the nearest ditch and call it a day!

[CraZdem4life]

4. eh..faux news?

why would you even think about using them as a news source? every word that comes out of their mouth is republican biased propaganada, courtesy of rupert murdoch. same for sky news in europe.

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

6. The significance here is...

...that Fox is willing to ADMIT how bad this could be. There's very little "new" info in the article that I haven't previously posted on DU from other, more "credible" sources.

What I would EXPECT from Fox is to simply go along with it and promote it because it's coming from the Bush White House.

Of course, the arrogance level has skyrocketed since the election, so maybe Fox just doesn't care what it tells people any more. When you can change the rules for Tom DeLay so that he can keep his job, you can do ALL KINDS OF crap.

:grr:

[nono]

7. That would cure S.S,

A lot of retired people on S.S. cannot buy their meds. now

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

10. No medicine, they die.

No burden on Social Security. Yup, that works.

[WI_DEM]

9. Why didn't he make this a major issue during the campaign?

this would have been dynamite.