Taxes

My corporate tax return is six days late. Once that is filed, I will have to deal with my personal taxes. That task in interminable, and that's just collecting data. My accountant does the the returns. Then I'll do my mothers taxes. You wouldn't think a guy living near the poverty line would have to file a corporate tax return or need an accountant. My accountant, Sue Engelstad, has kept me unaudited and out of jail for 25 years. Her fee used to represent maybe .1% of my income. Now it represents over 2%. But I still have this moribund publishing company, it still makes a little money, and I therefore must file a corporate return. Why don't I do it myself? Because I have a very low tolerance for details, those things that the Devil is in, the things he forwards to the IRS, the things that laws are full of.

Right now, I am writing this instead of turning my attention to collecting tax data. I am procrastinating, as are many of you. It is a cruel master who both taxes you and forces you to write the bill, often at the cost of a score or more of your precious hours, slave hours, for which you are not remunerated. There are few who wouldn't agree that our tax system is absurd, overcomplicated, and unfair. Of course, most people, whatever bracket they are in, believe it is unfair to them. The truth is, that as long as lobbyists have the influence to get special tax breaks for their clients to the tune of 76 billion dollars, fairness will not be part of the equation. And a special few got very individual treatment. Orin Hatch snuck in a last-second break for the biopharmaceutical company Amgen during the recent "fiscal cliff" negotiations, to the tune of 500 million. Most of the senators voting on the bill didn't even know it was in there. Amgen pays some 22 lobbyists to influence legislation. Orin Hatch has received tens of thousands in contributions from Amgen since 2008.

Naturally, corporations, interest groups, and individuals should have the right to petition the government for the redress of ills, even to request favors. This has been the case since the founding of our Republic. But as with taxes, the devils are in the details. How many lobbyists do you have? With whom would you speak if you had a legitimate request for an unorthodox tax break, or if you were unjustly targeted by the IRS? I have paid ridiculous sums in the past merely because the time and effort to make the IRS understand the actual situation would take too long and be unreasonably complex. We only have so much time to fight such battles. More often than not, you'll pay the traffic ticket rather than go to court to defend yourself against a false or exaggerated charge. I know I have. Similarly in court, defendants are pressured into plea bargains every day that are not in their best interests because they cannot afford to fight for their best interests. According to Conrad Black, the prosecution wins 99.5% of court cases in the United States. Really? 99.5%  percent of defendants are guilty? Randy Newman said it: "It's money that matters in the U.S.A. . . ." I think you could safely lay down money that the remaining .5% come from the "1%," the same group that are currently in charge of most of the rest of our economy.

Back to taxes. You could likely get 90% or more of Americans to agree that our tax system needs drastic reform. Well, good luck with that. Individuals and the government would both benefit greatly if we instituted an entirely different method of taxation, something straightforward and without loopholes and escape hatches. There are several models out there. I personally favor some kind of consumption tax, like the VAT in Europe, though like all things human, I'm sure it will be impossible to achieve complete fairness no matter what we do; yet surely we can come a lot closer than we do now.