“What Canada has to do is to have a government connected to the priorities of the people of which it is elected to serve. Those priorities include ensuring medicare is sustainable, support for the military, and tax and justice systems that work.” PeopleGovernmentJusticeSupportMilitaryTaxesConnectedPrioritiesCanadaMedicareJustice System Author:Peter MacKay
“All the big corporations depreciate their possessions, and you can, too, provided you use them for business purposes. For example, if you subscribe to the Wall Street Journal, a business-related newspaper, you can deduct the cost of your house, because, in the words of U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger in a landmark 1979 tax decision: Where else are you going to read the paper? Outside? What if it rains?” IfsUseBigsPurposeHouseJusticeDecisionStreetsExampleWallCostTaxesPaperHumorousRainCourtPossessionNewspapersSupremeChiefsCorporationsRelatedWhat IfJournalSupreme CourtBurgersLandmarksBig CorporationsDepreciateWall Street JournalChief JusticeBusiness Related Author:Dave Barry
“Liberty ... was a two-headed boon. There was first, the liberty of the people as a whole to determine the forms of their own government, to levy their own taxes, and to make their own laws.... There was second, the liberty of the individual man to live his own life, within the limits of decency and decorum, as he pleased -- freedom from the despotism of the majority.” PeopleMenFirstsTwoWholeGovernmentFormLawIndividualJusticeLibertyHonorLimitsTaxesMajorityDetermineIndividualismTaxationDecencyDespotismBoonDecorum Book:Alexander Hamilton: Lapham's Quarterly - Special Issue Source: Alexander Hamilton: Lapham's Quarterly - Special Issue
“When we ask what ought to be the relative remunerations of a nurse or a butcher, or a coal miner and a judge at a high court, of the deep sea diver of the cleaner of sewers, of the organiser of a new industry and a jockey, of the inspector of taxes and the inventor of a life-saving drug, of the jet-pilot or the professor of mathematics, the appeal to 'social justice' does not give us the slightest help in deciding.” GivingDoeHelpingAsksSocialJusticeSeaJudgingIndustryOughtDrugTaxesMathematicsSocial JusticeCourtSavingAppealsProfessorsRelativeNursePilotsCoalInventorJetCleanersButchersMinersSewersInspectorsJockeysLife SavingDeep SeaCoal MinersRemuneration Author:Friedrich August von Hayek
“However accurate or inaccurate the agency's numbers may be, tax law explicitly presumes that the IRS is always right -- and implicitly presumes that the taxpayer is always wrong -- in any dispute with the government. In many cases, the IRS introduces no evidence whatsoever of its charges; it merely asserts that a taxpayer had a certain amount of unreported income and therefore owes a proportionate amount in taxes, plus interest and penalties.” MayGovernmentLawCertainInterestJusticeNumbersCasesAmountTaxesEvidenceIncomeAgencyPlusAccurateIntroducingPenaltiesDisputesTaxpayersIrsAlways Wrong Author:James Bovard
“The United States has a huge budget deficit so taxes are going to have to go up and I certainly agree they should go up more on the rich than everyone else. That - that's just justice.” ShouldStatesJusticeUnitedUnited StatesRichHugeTaxesAgreeBudgetsDeficitBudget Deficit Author:Bill Gates
“Standardized tests are an indicator of the kind of service taxpayers are receiving - and whether schools, educators and policymakers are doing their jobs. In the United States, taxpayers spend almost $600 billion annually on public education, so it's not unreasonable to ask what all that money is producing. In fact, it's irresponsible not to know.” KnowsKindStatesFactsRealitySchoolJobsAsksPoliticsLeadershipWorkJusticeUnitedMoneyEducationUnited StatesPolicyTaxesTestsStrategyBillionsIdeologyReceivingTaxpayersIrresponsibleEducatorUnreasonablePublic EducationIndicators Author:Michelle Rhee
“Very quickly the lawyers in the Justice Department pulled together a set of recommendations about how we ought to defend the law as a constitutional matter. And it was the lawyers in the Justice Department who thought that it was important to include the tax power argument as part of it.” ImportantMatterTogetherLawJusticeOughtTaxesArgumentLawyerDepartmentRecommendations Author:Donald Verrilli Jr.
“Justice [Sonia]Sotomayor said, "Let's talk - you want to talk about the tax power."And I got like a 10-minute run on the tax power. And, boy, was I glad I did because I was able to get across this idea that, yes, this is a narrower ground on which you can affirm it. And I think everybody agrees. I think even the dissenting justices ultimately in the case agreed that, if Congress had expressly called it a tax, it would be indisputably constitutional.” IfsThinkingWantSaidIdeasWould BeRunningAbleJusticeBoysCasesMinutesTaxesAgreeCongressGlad Author:Donald Verrilli Jr.
“You know in fairness Gary [Johnson] and I have not agreed on a number of substantive issues in this campaign, tax policy, we've had some influence on each other, I think I've had some influence on him, on constructive engagement around the world, he's had some influence on me in criminal justice reform issues.” ThinkingKnowsWorldJusticeNumbersIssuesInfluencePolicyTaxesCriminalsCampaignsAround The WorldReformEngagementFairnessConstructiveJohnsonCriminal JusticeGary Author:William Weld
“I think the Ronald Reagan tax reform proposals are a step toward distributive justice. They redistribute the tax burden more equitably and more progressively among individuals and call upon business to carry a somewhat larger proportion of the total tax load. Both of these are steps toward equity and distributive justice.” ThinkingIndividualJusticeTaxesBurdenEquityProposal Author:Bruce Babbitt
“Taxes are the flip side of expenditures. The same issues apply on both sides. There are questions of fairness and justice as much in the way you take money away as in the way you disburse it.” JusticeTaxesFairness Author:Bruce Babbitt
“The British use a system where the profits a corporation reports to shareholders is what they pay taxes on. Whereas in America we require corporations to keep two sets of books, one for shareholders and one for the IRS, and the IRS records are secret. For publicly-traded companies, the British system would tend to align the interests of the government with the interests of the company because the company wants to report the biggest possible profit. Though, all wealthy countries have high taxes as wealth requires lots of common goods, from clean water to public education to a justice system.” BookCountryInterestWaterWealthJusticeCommonSecretTaxesWealthyCommon GoodJustice SystemPublic EducationClean Water Author:David Cay Johnston
“The Stamp Act was a direct tax imposed on the colonies by King George III. This act inevitably led to the American Revolution. Just as the Stamp Act did in 1765, Obamacare should act as a wake-up call. Chief Justice Roberts provides us with a similar call to action.” ShouldActionJusticeRevolutionKingsTaxesDirectWake UpChiefsStampsObamacareColonyAmerican RevolutionWake Up CallChief JusticeCall To ActionKing George IiiStamp Act Author:Rand Paul