Herman Cain's "9-9-9 tax plan"

[Accuser]

Originally Posted by www.hermancain.com

- Business Flat Tax – 9%
Gross income less all investments, all purchases from other businesses and all dividends paid to shareholders.
Empowerment Zones will offer additional deductions for payroll employed in the zone.
- Individual Flat Tax – 9%.
Gross income less charitable deductions.
Empowerment Zones will offer additional deductions for those living and/or working in the zone.
- National Sales Tax – 9%.
This gets the Fair Tax off the sidelines and into the game.

The plan would eliminate all other Federal taxes, tax rebates, and tax credits. Cain says it would include a requirement for a 2/3 majority of both the House and Senate to pass increases to any element of the tax. After implementation of this, Cain intends to implement The FairTax.

As a supporter of the FairTax and one who detests the current system, I can honestly say that...
This is the worst tax idea I have ever seen. Lets start from the top, shall we?

9% "business tax"
The current Federal corporate tax rate goes from 15% to 35%. It is calculated much the same way as individual income tax, though deductions reduce taxable income both with the current and proposed system. It's a straight tax decrease, which I'm not inherently opposed to. Though since the proposed 999 plan intends to generate as much revenue as the current system, it has to make up for this in other ways... unpleasant ways.

9% income tax
Many Americans pay no income tax now, and their employer pays a 7.65% payroll tax out of their wages. Even if the employer passes all of that savings on to the employee (though it's more likely to be passed to customers to increase competitiveness) that would already be a tax increase. In fact, this data from taxfoundation.org indicates that approximately the bottom 80% of American earners had a tax burden of 9% or less once tax rebates and credits were included (it's in the first table on the page). That means a 9% income tax will be an increase for the VAST majority of Americans and a MASSIVE decrease for the highest earners, who currently have an effective tax rate of 23% or more.

9% sales tax
Saving the best for last, I suppose. Lets ignore for a moment the horror of trying to impose a 9% sales tax on all new goods and services throughout the country (and the internet).
As anyone who's thought about taxes for more than 5 minutes knows, straight sales taxes are regressive. If you have to spend your entire paycheck to live under a roof and eat, you pay the highest tax rate. If you make a boatload of money beyond that, you can save it or invest it to increase your wealth. This part of the 9-9-9 proposal makes it not simply fair for everyone, but actually has the poor pay the highest tax rate, while the wealthy pay the lowest tax rate.

This tax plan is like a pass/fail intelligence test for Americans. On the one side, it's disheartening to see so many people in favor of it. On the other, it's nice to know that Cain will not be elected if Obama can explain the plan with any measure of efficacy. Anyone here have thoughts on the 9-9-9 plan, Cain, or Obama's victory if Cain is the GOP nominee?

[Firefly]

I think FairTax is retarded. I also think Herman Cain is a joke and this plan of his is retarded. 9-9-9 may have worked for pizza and maybe it made HIM rich, but will it make the country rich? Will it make average Americans rich?

[BorisBlade]

Total agreement, much like most replublican stuff lately, its a way to help the rich and screw everyone else. Sad to see the party i had voted for long ago turn into either complete idiots or corporately owned evil asshats. Normally i laugh at things that sound conspiracy-ish like this, but now its out in the open they focus on corporations and the obscenely rich at the expense of everyone else.

Not sure what worries me more, the thought they are just helping themselves and the corporations who pay them (legally in complete secrecy now thanks to republicans) and screwin anyone who cant pay their way in, or the fact they might actually be so completely stupid as to believe their own crap they spin and that same person is actually in charge of some things in this country and we have to pay them as well. And on top of that, people vote for these guys, even the people who are really hurt the most by them, its insanity.

[Geist]

But guys, it has a spiffy name, after all, just saying the word "Change" got Obama elected.

But in all seriousness, all of the politicians in Washington need to be purged with holy fire, the amount of corruption and stupidity is ridiculous. We don't just need an overhaul of the tax system, we need an overhaul of the entire federal government.

[Firefly]

In Great Britain, 999 is their version of 911. I found Cain's plan ironic.

[Accuser]

Originally Posted by Firefly

In Great Britain, 999 is their version of 911. I found Cain's plan ironic.

I heard they changed that...

[Traak]

I have a new tax plan. 50% tax on anyone who makes over 100,000 dollars in a year, and zero percent on anyone else.

Tax revenues would skyrocket, and the life of most people would vastly improve.

There. Problem solved.

[Zulthus]

Originally Posted by Traak

I have a new tax plan. 50% tax on anyone who makes over 100,000 dollars in a year, and zero percent on anyone else.

Tax revenues would skyrocket, and the life of most people would vastly improve.

There. Problem solved.

Traak for president

[duomaxwl]

Herman Cain Stealing from SimCity 4

Also, on the bottom of the article, there is a video about Herman Cain using a song from Pokemon in his speech. He's a winner alright.

[Geist]

Originally Posted by Traak

I have a new tax plan. 50% tax on anyone who makes over 100,000 dollars in a year, and zero percent on anyone else.

Tax revenues would skyrocket, and the life of most people would vastly improve.

There. Problem solved.

God, that is the worst idea I've ever heard. First off, anyone making even slightly more the 100k would actually have less money than someone at a 99k salary, so no one would want to go past that "sweet spot", the the unemployment rate would sky rocket due to small businesses not having enough capital to hire ANYONE and more than likely will have to fire the employees they do have, if they don't shut down because they can't pay the rent, and the super rich will find even more reason to either avoid taxes or leave the country.

You really need to think before you talk, I can only take so much stupidity at one time.

[Traak]

If I say "people should all be paid in pink balloons", then I laugh to think of what you would do. Attempt suicide? Smash your computer on the floor? Have a sex change?

Turn down the estrogen. Being able to send you into a foot-stamping frustrated little tizzy with one offhand statement is entertaining, I have to say.

Impose a 1000% duty on all goods either made in China, shipped on a non-U.S. owned fleet or in a non-U.S.-owned container from Asia, and make the country of origin label be half of the entire front of the package, if it isn't made in the USA, kind of like they do with cancer warnings on cigarettes in some countries.

Imagine, Wal-Mart having to sell plastic trinkets at only a 10,000 percent markup instead of 1,000,000 percent markup.

Imagine, factories in America, you know, where there are product quality laws, such as not being able to put poison in milk, and no U-235-based paint on children's toys, actually producing stuff that lasted more than three uses before failing.

Then, put a giant wall across the Southern border, manned by anyone in the USA who was an illegal alien, whose "community service" to gain citizenship is a year on the wall keeping others out.

There. Problems solved.

Want to address the trade imbalance? How about for every ten dollars spent on Chinese goods, China, has to spend one hundred on American-made goods? There. So simple.

[Geist]

Originally Posted by Traak

If I say "people should all be paid in pink balloons", then I laugh to think of what you would do. Attempt suicide? Smash your computer on the floor? Have a sex change?

Turn down the estrogen. Being able to send you into a foot-stamping frustrated little tizzy with one offhand statement is entertaining, I have to say.

Impose a 1000% duty on all goods either made in China, shipped on a non-U.S. owned fleet or in a non-U.S.-owned container from Asia, and make the country of origin label be half of the entire front of the package, if it isn't made in the USA, kind of like they do with cancer warnings on cigarettes in some countries.

Imagine, Wal-Mart having to sell plastic trinkets at only a 10,000 percent markup instead of 1,000,000 percent markup.

Imagine, factories in America, you know, where there are product quality laws, such as not being able to put poison in milk, and no U-235-based paint on children's toys, actually producing stuff that lasted more than three uses before failing.

Then, put a giant wall across the Southern border, manned by anyone in the USA who was an illegal alien, whose "community service" to gain citizenship is a year on the wall keeping others out.

There. Problems solved.

Want to address the trade imbalance? How about for every ten dollars spent on Chinese goods, China, has to spend one hundred on American-made goods? There. So simple.

Can't really tell if serious. Oh well, maybe I can look to others for intelligent discussion.

[SgtMAD]

Originally Posted by Traak

I have a new tax plan. 50% tax on anyone who makes over 100,000 dollars in a year, and zero percent on anyone else.

Tax revenues would skyrocket, and the life of most people would vastly improve.

There. Problem solved.

thats just retarded,that would make almost every middle class family in the country have to pay 50%,what we need is a sales tax on everything that isn't considered food,utilities or healthcare related,that way the ppl that are spending the most as consumers would be paying the larger percentage of the taxes,if you buy that one hundred thousand dollar car then you should have to pay federal sales tax,this way the ppl with all the money get taxed for everything they buy and the poor would not have their taxes raised through the roof.

[Accuser]

Originally Posted by HtSgtMAD

what we need is a sales tax on everything that isn't considered food,utilities or healthcare related,that way the ppl that are spending the most as consumers would be paying the larger percentage of the taxes

I think you'd like the FairTax if you saw how progressive it is designed to be. Though as I said, Cain would never switch from the regressive 9-9-9 plan to the FairTax.

[CutterJohn]

I'm wary of the 'fair tax' since it seems its primary purpose is to ditch corporate taxes entirely. Corporations don't spend much money that is not a business expense. I concede that most corporate taxes are pretty much just passed on to the consumer, but I highly doubt they would just suddenly lower their prices. I find it considerably more likely they would keep their prices as is and let the consumer eat the additional tax. Having their cake and eating it too.

The fair tax seems interesting, but I would definitely love to see them run an experiment on it first. Perhaps in Alaska, where there is no easy state line to cross to buy from a state.

Otherwise my first preference would be to simply end all subsidies, credits, loopholes, and settle on a lower income tax rate. I'm fine with a few tax credits, but there should be limits on how many they can legally mandate.