[JauntTrooper]

There are problems with every type of tax.

Property taxes are tough because many assets are hard to value/assess and often don’t pay enough cash flow to cover their taxes, which could lead to forcing a sale (at fire sale prices for illiquid assets).

Sales taxes tend to hit lower income people the hardest since they’re spending most of their income while the wealthy are not. You could adjust for this, but then it becomes complicated and administratively burdensome.

Tariffs distort trade and slow economic growth (though there are many people that find that trade-off worth it for other reasons).

I think a lot our system in the US is designed for ease for collection, rather than what is most efficient.

The good thing about corporate taxes is that corporations tend to be more meticulous about tracking their income and expenses, and probably also about paying their legal taxes on time than individuals. Tax revenue collected would probably plummet if we did away with the W-4 withholding system on individual income taxes and people had to file them once a quarter/year like corporations do.

[leetcrew]

maybe this is overly cynical, but I suspect it goes further than "ease of collection". the average person is unlikely to strongly oppose corporate income taxes because they believe it doesn't take any money out of their pocket. if they understood tax incidence, and how little consensus there is among economists regarding corporate tax incidence, they might feel differently.

the US tax system seems to be designed more towards political expedience than any other goal. sales tax, which voters feel every day, is relatively low compared to VAT implementations in Europe. the income tax hits high earners pretty hard, but there are innumerable loopholes and exceptions for very wealthy holders of capital to avoid paying significant capital gains.

it seems like the whole system is setup to look like it's fleecing rich people while it subtly sabotages itself in thousands of pages of tax law.

edit: also you are probably right that we would have trouble collecting tax if we eliminated withholding, but what does that have to do with corporate income tax?

[analog31]

Indeed, if we eliminated withholding, a large swath of people would simply have no money to pay their taxes.

[humanrebar]

> You could adjust for this, but then it becomes complicated and administratively burdensome.

Minimum income is fairly simple. As are earned income tax credits.

It's no more complicated than free need-based bus passes to offset flat bus fares.