Representing North Carolina’s Ninth District                                                                        

Tax Day is no Holiday

Many calendars have April 15th denoted as “Tax Day” like it’s a holiday!  Maybe it is a holiday for the IRS; but for the rest of us it is a nightmare.

I think we sometimes forget that almost everything in America is now taxed. 

We pay taxes when we pump gas, make a phone call or buy groceries.  We pay taxes to get a hunting or fishing license, we pay taxes when we purchase a car and to register it each year.  We even have to pay taxes on our property and our homes.  We pay taxes on everything under the sun, and then the government sets aside April 15th as the day they want us to make sure we paid them all. 

The IRS estimates that this year the average person will spend 6 hours 17 minutes to prepare a basic 1040 tax form.  Take that time and add an additional 7 hours and 18 minutes to assemble tax records, read the instructions, calculate the taxes, and submit the form.  Wouldn’t you rather spend 13 hours and 35 minutes playing with your kids or enjoying a hobby?

Worse yet, filling out tax forms is a process filled with complexities and we face severe penalties if we don’t fill out the tax forms properly.  The simple fact is that our tax system is out of control.  We must make our tax system a more fair and simple process. 

Currently, there is a bill before Congress called the Fair Tax Act.  This bill would repeal the income tax and other taxes, abolish the Internal Revenue Service, and enact a national sales tax to be administered primarily by the States.  I support this bill, and bills like it, because it would actually simplify our tax system; not just put more band aids on a failed system.
 
I believe in the simple idea that tax dollars are the people’s money- not the federal governments.  The more money people have in their pockets, and the less the government gets in your way, the more prosperous America will be.  Simplifying the tax code will save millions of tax dollars by eliminating the IRS, and would put more money in your pocket because it would eliminate unneeded and burdensome taxes.

Remember, when you are filing your taxes there is someone in Washington fighting to change the tax system so that you can keep more of your hard earned money.  We need tax simplification so that we get back those 13 hours and 35 minutes each year, and so we can mark “Tax Day” off our calendars forever.  

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