Chuck Harris wrote:

Richard The Dreaded Libertarian wrote:


Well, you don't tax grocery store food or medical supplies, for one
thing.
Restaurant food, take-out pizza, convenience store food, all that's
taxable because they're luxuries.


Once you start making exceptions, you are on your way to a mess of
a tax system like we have now.


And if you go to Kmart and buy a $5.00 pair of jeans, you pay $0.50 tax;
you go to Saks and buy a $250.00 pair of jeans, you pay $25.00 tax.

What does "regressive" mean anyway?


Basic costs of living are a larger percentage of a poor person's income
than they are of a rich person's income. If you tax those basic costs with
a "sales tax", it is a regressive tax. This is because the tax is a larger
percentage of the poor person's income than it is of the rich person.


If there's a 10% sales tax, then

the guy who buys a $2.00 toilet brush pays .20 tax,


The poor guy who pays that tax will have to work about 1 minute to pay
the tax. The rich guy will have to work a small fraction of a second
to pay the tax. That's regressive.


What's the difference to today's system? A burger flipper will have to
work 30-40 minutes to buy that brush while an engineer will have to work
maybe five minutes. Of course, at young age the engineer had his nose to
the grind stone to get his degree while the burger flipper partied.

--
Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com