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by Mountain_Skies
194 days ago
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In the US about twenty years ago, there was a minor movement for a flat sales tax that would replace all other taxes. I lived in Georgia at the time, which was the epicenter of support for the idea. Proponents got themselves stuck in a metaphoric tarpit when they wouldn't accept that most people's way of calculating sales tax was different than what they promoted. At least in the US, if there's a 7% sales tax, it means if you buy something for a dollar, you pay seven cents in tax. Their flat sales tax would have been 30% using this method, but they wanted to promote it as being only 23% since $0.30 is 23% of $1.30. I'm sure there were other reasons why it failed, but for the people I knew who supported it, claiming it to be a 23% sales tax instead of a 30% sales tax was a hill they were willing to let the whole thing die on (and it did die). Lots of people who casually supported it at first when they heard 23%, lost interest when it was clarified what that really meant. The difference between 23% and 30% isn't all that great but if you're going to overhaul the tax system, trust in those who are doing it is needed. |
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