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Trump's Tax Returns Show Evil Of The Income Tax

by Ron Paul via The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity

http://ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/featured-articles/2023/january/09/trump-s-tax-returns-show-evil-of-the-income-tax/

The final act of the Democrat majority on the House Ways and Means
Committee was to make public several years of Donald Trump’s tax
returns, which the Committee obtained after a prolonged legal battle.
The tax returns confirmed that, despite being one of the richest
people in America, Donald Trump paid very little in federal income
tax. In fact, in at least one year he paid under a thousand dollars.

Trump’s success in minimizing his tax liability without ever being
audited is surprising only to those who think IRS audits are mainly
used to catch rich “tax cheats.” According to data released by the
Syracuse University Transactional Records Clearinghouse, in 2022
lower-income taxpayers were five and half times more likely than
millionaires and billionaires to be audited! This is because
low-income taxpayers cannot afford to hire top-notch tax attorneys and
accountants to help fight the IRS, so they are more likely to give in
to the agency’s demands.

Despite claims of the Biden Administration and its Congressional
allies, the $80 million in additional funds provided to the agency as
a part of the misnamed “Inflation Reduction Act” will likely increase
the tax agency’s targeting of low- and middle-income Americans.

Proponents of a flat tax or national sales tax argue that such a
system would ensure millionaires and billionaires paid their “fair
share” of taxes. Saying we must all pay our “fair share” of taxes
assumes we have a moral obligation to the government that can only be
fulfilled by turning over as much of our income as our so-called
“public servants” demand. This is not the case. Individuals have a
moral duty to support their families, and to support private charities
if they wish. They do not have a moral duty to support the government.

Tax reform proponents also complain that the current tax code contains
too many loopholes that cause economic distortions and inefficiencies.
It is true that the current tax system promotes inefficiency, but this
is caused by the income tax itself, not the loopholes. Conversely,
loopholes actually promote economic efficiency by giving taxpayers the
ability to spend more of their money the way they prefer, rather than
allowing politicians to spend it. As economist Thomas DiLorenzo put
it, “private individuals always spend their own money more efficiently
than government bureaucrats do.”

Some have expressed concerns that the use of President Trump’s tax
records as part of the Democrat and Deep State effort to discredit him
sets a dangerous precedent that will lead to increased use of tax
information as a political weapon. The sad fact is that ever since its
creation, politicians have used the IRS as a tool for punishing
political opponents. As an IRS agent told the head of conservative
organization who was being audited after calling for the impeachment
of then-President Bill Clinton, “What do you expect when you target
the President?”

The major problem with the income tax, and the reason it must be
eliminated, not merely “reformed,” is that it is rooted in the idea
that the government has first claim on our income. This idea is
incompatible with a free society. Furthermore, the income tax must
also be repealed because the force of the IRS, along with the fraud of
the Federal Reserve, is one of the two foundations of the
welfare-warfare state that erodes our liberty and prosperity. The only
way to avoid 1984 is to repeal 1913.