This one is going to be unpopular.
I know this because in the past, I've written diaries that deviated from the accepted Kossack take on things, and I've gotten slammed for it. However, with the American public finally waking up to the immense screwing they're getting from the Captains of Industry, it might be time to look at an admittedly smaller screwing they're getting from themselves.
One of the biggest and best complaints of the Occupy (fill in the city) movement is the racket big business enjoys in the liberal (pardon the word) use of loopholes, a.k.a. write-offs. From corporate jets to late fees, companies are thriving on the write-off diet and busily trying to get a compliant Congress to give them more. We've all heard of the dodge of moving corporate offices overseas by simply changing the address on the company letterhead or the registering of U.S. cruise ships in friendly countries like the Bahamas or Liberia. Write-offs and tax dodges are as American as, well, the American Dream, all the items of which are for sale - house, car, TV, etc.
What we often don't realize is that every write-off represents a sum of money that should be going to support the United States of America and that every dime that's written off by Company A has to be made up by Joe Blow B. That means that the corporate jet used by some big wig to fly to an anti-union seminar is being paid for by some of the members of the union that's under seige. That's what's wrong with write-offs. But how about us "ordinary taxpayers?"
If we own a house, we get to write off the interest we pay the bank. Why? We can deduct a capital loss on the house if we sell it for less than we have invested in it or we can pay taxes on the capital gain if we make money on it, but why on earth should we get to deduct the interest on our loans? Does the guy working next to us get to deduct his rent? Why deduct gifts to charity when it's simply the right thing to do? Are bribes needed to make us human?
The tax code is loaded with hundreds of deductions and write-offs that give weeks of work to tax "experts" or keep us awake at night every April. By taking them, we're asking our neighbors to pay for them and they're asking us to pay for theirs. The chances of this coming out even are very low.
In other words, the tax code makes us all players in a "screw your neighbor" game in which our eagerness to lower our own liabilities makes us willing to increase the liabilities of others.
I favor getting rid of all write-offs. Pay for what you'd stand to lose if there was no government to protect you. No army, navy, air force, national guard, state police, fire department or neighborhood cop. No library, school, community center, hospital or town hall. No roads, highways, bridges or airports. Just you and your trusty .38.
The more you have to lose, the more you should pay - just like insurance. Take a percentage of your net worth and send it in. That's all. No deductions. No write-offs. The same rules for everybody.
No selective screwing.