[ale] [OT -- I know, right?] Re: tier2-3 support

[JK]

On 5/7/2010 7:06 AM, Lightner, Jeff wrote:

> You'd also want to calculate in the self employment tax (SSN) since
> you'll have to pay that.   Of course you also get a credit for part of
> that on another form (go figure - they take it with the right and give
> some back with the left).

I'm a "liberal", I guess -- someone somewhere has the sig "I like
paying taxes -- with them I buy civilization", and I can get behind
that, especially since I can literally look over the border at
northern Mexico and watch what happens when civil society utterly
collapses [*].

But the US tax system is totally psychotic.  And it seems
essentially un-fixable -- there are so many people and institutions
that depend upon the complexity of the tax code for their
livelihood, and so many powerful institutions with a vested
interest in the current tax code's complexity (== loopholes
you could sail the Titanic through), that I can't see a simple
path from here to something like a simple universal consumption
tax or even a drastically simplified income tax. (Not that I'm
a lawyer or accountant or anything...)

[*] On which subject, I mentioned a couple months ago that
my friend's sister-in-law had been kidnapped in Juarez and
held for ransom.  Her family did get her back safely, but
is about $20000USD poorer for the experience.  Now THAT's
what I call a free market!

-- JK


-- 
Forget Jesus: stars died so that you could be here today.
  - physicist Lawrence Krauss