Code corruption

[ilbegone]

Code corruption

Editorial commentary by Steve Williams, Opinion Editor for the Daily Press concerning the Tax Code, The IRS, Congress, and sheep like citizens.

January 15, 2010



Did you know that Douglas Shulman — if the name doesn’t ring a bell, it’s because he has a very low profile job; he’s the commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service — pays someone to fill out his tax returns? And he’s done it for the past 10 years?



Shulman told C-SPAN over the weekend, “I find the tax code complex so I use a preparer.” So he's among the 60 percent of tax filers who hire specialists to fill out their returns for them.



Which brings up government’s latest intrusion into individual lives and private business. As we noted in this space the other day, there are an estimated one million people who do business as tax preparers, and now they’re going to be required to register with the IRS and take a test, apparently to prove they’re knowledgeable enough about the tax code to prepare returns for someone else. One wonders if Mr. Shulman could pass such a test. And one suspects he couldn’t, which is why he doesn’t prepare his own return.



Whose fault? Oh, there are the usual suspects, Congress of course leading the list. But there are other culprits too, and they include any number of the one million we just mentioned. They of course don’t want the tax code simplified. If, for instance, tax reformers who want the code replaced by a flat tax, and the resultant obligations of taxpayers simplified to the extent that the whole thing could be done on a post card, those one million preparers would have to look elsewhere for gainful employment.



The last estimate we heard was that the average American taxpayer pays something on the order of $300 to have his tax form completed by someone else, and that the army of accountants, lawyers and the like sucks about $50 billion out of the economy every year just to comply with the IRS’s demands. That’s a sorry — not to say hideous — state of affairs.



The other reason the tax code is so complex, you’ll not be surprised to learn, is that it’s the easiest way members of Congress have to sell their influence. The tax code — 75,000 pages and growing at last count — is chockablock with special exemptions, dodges, rebates and outright giveaways to favored friends of our elected elite. Those exemptions, dodges, rebates and giveaways come at a price in the form of donations to the Congressional member who figures out how to alter the code to make them possible. But even bribing Congress members is cheaper than paying the tax.



The last poll we saw on the subject showed Congressional approval at 26.4 percent, and disapproval at 67.5 percent. One of the prime reasons it got so abysmal in the first place was because of the tax code, wholly and entirely formulated by a corrupted Congress.



And still we don't revolt. Conclusion? Sheep deserve to be sheared.