Tuesday, April 15, 2008

tax tips from a pro

April 15th, tax deadline, a date which for 30 years has found me exhausted -- not from writing those checks to the IRS, which is tiring enough, but by working my butt off so that everyone else can write those checks to the IRS. So tonight, for me personally, is a night to celebrate getting a life back that approximates normality.

I of course have my opinions about the IRS and know U.S. tax laws better than the average taxpayer does. It's a highly messy cesspool of regulations and rules, but it's something, and I get a kick out of the occasional politician who tries to score points by wanting to "abolish the IRS". It sounds so nice in the abstract, but replace it with what? -- Something that no doubt will benefit his or her major contributors.

The people that really annoy me are the "anti-tax" people: the ones who don't want any of their tax dollars going to something they don't use -- mass transit, maybe, or parks or libraries or poor people. My answer to those loudmouths is that none of their tax dollars do go to those things -- Let's say that my tax dollars are spent on those things. And let's say that none of my tax dollars go for military spending. The anti-tax people never complain about the $700-billion military budget, which is almost more than all the other countries' in the world military budgets combined. Literal overkill. So their taxes can go for war. My taxes can go to feeding starving children and none toward bombing them. Let's all pick and choose. We can all find something in government spending that we like.

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