Fair Tax would also be good for businesses Re: “Fair Tax would eliminate income tax fraud,” From Readers, March 27
Glen Terrell makes some excellent points about the Fair Tax, but I have some things to add.
First, eliminating the cost of compliance for businesses is its most salient point. The Fair Tax has its roots in business owners’ frustrations with spending money to comply with the tax code, which is added to their actual products and services. The Fair Tax eliminates those costs for consumers.
Second, the Fair Tax applies only to retail purchases. This means 100 percent visibility of all taxes paid, unlike our current system.
I would be remiss not to mention the prebate feature, which ensures that every American household has sufficient funds to purchase basic necessities.
There are a number of tax plans far better than what we have now, and the Fair Tax is definitely one of them.
Brian Wrenn
Washington
Even Fair Tax won’t stop fraudulent activity
Re: “Fair Tax would eliminate income tax fraud,” From Readers, March 27
Glen Terrell argues that the Fair Tax would eliminate income tax fraud. He mentioned crooks getting victims’ Social Security numbers and filing fraudulent returns to intercept their tax refunds.
But the so-called Fair Tax is a national sales tax with prebates. Crooks could try to find ways to collect the prebates by filing for nonexistent families using honest citizens’ stolen identities.
A much better reform would be to tax the value of land. There wouldn’t be much opportunity for fraud, since you can’t put an acre of American land in an offshore bank account, and there wouldn’t normally be any tax refund to intercept.
More important, we would discourage real estate speculation instead of taxing honest work and giving special low tax rates to land speculators.
Nicholas D. Rosen
Arlington
“Stand-your-ground” law does not apply to Zimmerman
Re: “Race-baiting in Florida case,” From Readers, March 26
Contrary to Christopher Hollins, the crux of the matter is whether Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law can is applicable to George Zimmerman’s claim of self-defense. Former Gov. Jeb. Bush, who signed it into law, appeared on ABC’s “World News” Saturday and said “the law did not say you chase someone down and shoot them.”
In addition, Florida state Rep. Dennis Baxley, who introduced the law, told USA Today that “the law was not written to give people the power to pursue and confront others.” He also indicated that “it might not apply to the Trayvon Martin case.”
According to CBSnews.com, under the law “a person in Florida is justified in using deadly force against another if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the commission of forcible felony.” Where in the law does it give people the power to pursue and confront others?
Cargill Kelly
Manassas
