Tax Day Food For Thought

Depending on the time of day when you read this, you may want to refill your coffee cup or grab a fresh adult beverage, because this post is on the lengthy side. It may also tend to increase your blood pressure, or alternatively depress you. Either way, make sure you have the appropriate medication on hand.

When it comes to paying taxes, the obama White House sets a sterling example [/sarcasm].

41 Obama White House aides owe the IRS $831,000 in back taxes

That does not include obama cabinet members and appointees, most notably tax cheats Timothy Geitner (Sec. of the Treasury), Hilda Solis (Sec. of Labor), and Tom Daschle (nominated as Sec. of Health and Human Services who withdrew after his tax cheating came to light).

Following the example set by top administration officials and other government executives, thousands of federal employees owe $1 billion in back taxes. It's gotten so bad that U.S. Senator Scott Brown (R-MA) has introduced legislation to force them to pay up.

U.S. Sen. Scott Brown is pushing a new bill that he said would make it easier to collect back taxes from federal workers and members of Congress.

The Massachusetts Republican said that a recent report by the Internal Revenue Service showed that in 2010, 98,000 federal employees owed a combined $1 billion in back taxes.

Brown said members and employees of the U.S. Senate alone owed over $2 million.

The Senate isn't alone.

• In the House of Representatives, 421 people owe a total $6,524,892.
• In the IRS' parent department, Treasury, 1,204 owe $7,670,814.
• At the Labor Department, 463 owe $7,481,463.
• Eighty-one workers for the Federal Reserve System's board of governors owe $1,076,733.
• Over at the Justice Department ... 1,971 employees still owe $14,350,152 in overdue taxes.

Tax cheats should be in jail, not working for the federal government.

And don't forget the hypocrisy displayed by obama and his buddy Warren Buffett.

Who's the bigger hypocrite?

Barack Obama, who schmoozes the wealthy for campaign contributions while waging a phony class war against "millionaires and billionaires."

-- or --

Warren Buffett, who publicly complains that his secretary pays a higher tax rate than he does while his company privately battles the IRS over $1 billion in unpaid taxes.

Personally, I think it's a tie.

In the Perception vs. Reality department, a recent poll reveals that most Americans think the current tax system favors the wealthy.

As procrastinators rush to file their 2011 tax returns by the Tuesday deadline, a new poll shows more than two-thirds of Americans believe the revenue system benefits the wealthy while being unfair to average workers.

Contrast that with who pays how much in taxes.

Americans making over $50,000 paid most of the federal taxes that were paid in the U.S. in 2010.

According to statistics compiled from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) by the Tax Foundation, those people making above $50,000 had an effective tax rate of 14.1 percent, and carried 93.3 percent of the total tax burden.

In contrast, Americans making less than $50,000 had an effective tax rate of 3.5 percent and their total share of the tax burden was just 6.7 percent.

Americans making more than $250,000 had an effective tax rate of 23.4 percent and their total share of the tax burden was 45.7 percent.

Out of the 143 million tax returns that were filed with the IRS in 2010, 58 million – or 41 percent – of those filers were non-payers.

But Tax Foundation data also shows that people who didn’t pay any income tax received $105 billion in refundable tax credits from the IRS.

So a large chunk of people who don't pay taxes -- who in fact received over $100 billion in 'refunds' -- think the tax system is unfair. I guess they want those of us who do pay taxes to pay more so that they can get a larger handout.

For any liberals that might wander here by mistake and have trouble understanding words and numbers, here's a picture that might help you understand.

Notice how the top 40%, beginning with a household income of only $ 69K, pay proportionally more in taxes than they earn? And how the bottom 60% pay less? Now talk to me again about who is and is not paying their fair share.

Don't get me wrong. I don't like paying taxes. I think the current system is overly burdensome and complex, and riddled with loopholes that favor a wide assortment of special interests, not just 'the rich.'

... statistics from the Tax Foundation shows that the federal tax code is 3.8 million words long – 3.5 times longer than all seven books of J.K. Rowling’s famous Harry Potter series combined.

... the federal tax code is 3.8 million words, almost a tripling of its size since 2001 when the Joint Committee on Taxation estimated the tax code to be 1,395,000, and almost doubling its size since the Tax Foundation's estimates in 2001.

If it was up to me, we'd throw out the whole damn tax code and start over - preferably with a national sales tax or a flat tax. Either one would be better than the mess we've got now.

In fact, it's so bad that even obama is doing worse under obama:

"President Obama released his tax returns. It turns out he made $900,000 less in 2011 than he did in 2010. You know what that means? Even Obama is doing worse under President Obama."

 -- Jay Leno

Always leave 'em laughing...