[lsaferite]

The FairTax proposal in the US addressed this with a "prebate" that was mailed out to every person (not sure the criteria) at the beginning of the year. This was a check that covered the taxes on base (poverty?) level spending. This was meant to remove the regressive taxation effect.

[rmc]

Nice in theory. In practice how many really poor people have address, or bank accounts which they can use to lodge it?