Are companies such as Amazon, Apple, and Google morally bankrupt because of their attempts to minimize their income tax?

Absolutely not. 
 

There is a deep underlying problem here. And that problem is called ‘The Income Tax’. Taxing income is the worst sort of tax that there is. First, it is impossible to define ‘income’ consistently because it is typically considered to be 'gross income minus expenses'. But what is an expense? In the United States a Realtor can subtract the cost of car travel from his income. But someone who drives to work and back home cannot. What’s fair

It’s so difficult to determine what’s fair that the income tax code in the US is more than 2,000,000 words long. There’s not a single person in the world who understands it. 

The worst thing about it is that it gives almost everyone the idea that just because a person or company earns lots of money, they owe you, me, the country, or the world, money. And why is that? There is no moral reason that they should be taxed just because they earned money. 

One could more easily argue the opposite: those individuals and companies that earn money do so because they are providing a product or service that people want. 

Rather than tax them on their profits, we should be thankful for such companies, because of the jobs and services that they provide. But an income tax punishes them.

Rather than be envious (a sin) that an honest person or company is prosperous, we should be happy that they were rewarded for their efforts to provide us with their service. And then we might be motivated to work harder, earn more money, and enjoy the fruits of our labor. 

I'm glad Apple has a presence in Ireland to try to minimize their income tax. When the income tax rate is 0% for all, I’ll be happy.

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You might ask, “But we need taxes, so what’s a good alternative?” We do need taxes, but they need to be moral taxes. 

And what taxes are moral? Taxes are moral if they are essentially ‘user fees’ for the use of some government provided service. 

For example, a road tax, that charges per mile traveled per weight of a vehicle, is a fair tax. It is a tax that pays for the amount of road used up by a vehicle.

A land tax charged for the private use of land is also a fair tax. Because the owner of land did not create the land, it is appropriate to charge a monthly or yearly land tax, so that the land owner compensates the rest of us for the fact that the owner is given control over that land. 

One last example is a natural resource tax on those companies that extract scarce natural resources from the ground. For example, a company might gain the right to extract bauxite, an ore of aluminum, so that they can refine it and sell the aluminum. This is good because aluminum is a metal we need. And it is appropriate to charge a tax per ton of aluminum extracted, because the company did not create the aluminum. So again, the tax compensates the rest of us for the right to extract a natural resource.

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Let's get rid of the immoral and unworkable income tax, and replace it with taxes that are moral, and that do not discourage the creation of a product or service.

Tim Farage is a Senior Lecturer in the Computer Science Department at The University of Texas at Dallas, and a former Professor of Mathematics. The views expressed herein are those of the author. Some of his main interests are in online education, and the reconciliation between science and spirituality. You are welcome to comment upon this blog entry and/or to contact him at tfarage@hotmail.com.

Government based upon Natural Law - (Part 4) - The Advantages of a Natural Resource Tax

Introduction 

In a previous post, "Government based upon Natural Law - (Part 3) - The Income Tax is Bad", the many and various disadvantages to having an income tax were discussed.  In this post, fair, just, and efficient alternatives to the income tax are given. 

What kinds of taxes are just?

What kinds of taxes are fair and just? Fair and just taxes are those that pay for the use of a government-provided service; these are frequently called "user fees".

Actually, many of our current taxes are just.  The gasoline tax is a good example.  The government (federal, state or local) builds and maintains the majority of the roads.  It is fair and just that those who use the roads the most should pay the most for them.   A semi-truck that travels 100,000 miles a year should clearly pay more for the roads than Aunt Pearl who drives to church on Sunday in her Ford Taurus.  Since the amount of gasoline a vehicle uses is proportional to the weight of that vehicle and the distance it travels, gasoline taxes are a relatively fairer way to pay for the roads, (although a road tax based upon the weight of the vehicle and the miles driven would even be better).

The FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) provides another good example of a just tax.  The FAA exists mainly to monitor air traffic and ensure the safety of aircraft. Clearly, the people who fly are the ones who should pay for this.  And this is currently the case, because each airline ticket has attached a small federal tax on it to pay for the FAA.

How about taxing human-caused pollution? By definition, human-caused pollution consists of substances that harm either people or plants or animals. Thus, it would be fair and just to tax a polluter in proportion to the harm caused by the pollutant for which they are responsible. This also results in the beneficial side effect of encouraging less pollution, since creating less pollution means paying less pollution tax. And it so happens that those who are rich usually pollute more for the simple reason that they own more cars, homes, boats, jets, etc. Thus a pollution tax would naturally cost more for those who can most afford to pay it.

(As an aside, the EPA has recently defined carbon dioxide as a pollutant so that they can regulate its emissions.  This was a mistake, since carbon dioxide is essential to life, and is not harmful to humans, plants, or animals.  On the contrary, plants breathe in carbon dioxide, and would die without it, and we would shortly follow suit.  Many think that it is a major contributor to global warming, but that is not a reason to label it  pollutant. Having a CO2 tax will do nothing to prevent global warming, but it will harm the poor here and abroad, because it will increase the price of gasoline and electricity. (But this is the subject for a another post).

Each of the taxes mentioned above, I believe, would fit the definition of fairness of any five-year-old. 

Reasons for Having a Natural-Resource Tax

However, there are some legitimate and constitutional functions of the government for which it is more difficult to assess how we can be fairly taxed to pay for them.  The military, foreign affairs, FBI, police, and fire departments fit into this category.  How can we fairly pay for them?  One way to think about this is to ask, "Who gets more protection from the military or the police or fire departments, Bill Gates or Aunt Pearl?"  While Aunt Pearl only has, say, a small apartment that benefits from military or police protection, Bill Gates gets quite a bit more protection because he owns many vehicles, buildings, and acres of land.  And he would suffer much more loss if we were to be successfully invaded by a foreign power.  The general principle is that those individuals or companies that own the most land or other natural resources should pay the most for these kinds of government services.  Thus, a natural-resource tax (NRT) would be a fair and just tax to be placed upon us.  Such natural resources include land, as well as coal, oil, aluminum and other minerals, etc. 

Another principle concerning natural resources is that they are a product of nature (i.e. our Creator and His Helpers) and thus are not produced by man.  Therefore, the only just way to deal with natural resources is to treat them as the property of the people as a whole.  So, if government wishes to sell or lease land or sell the rights to a company so that it can extract a natural resource, it is appropriate to tax that resource as compensation to the people for allowing the use or extraction of that resource from the commonwealth.

For example, in Alaska, private companies are permitted to extract oil from the ground.  To compensate the people of Alaska for this, Alaska taxes each barrel of oil removed, and that money goes into Alaska's Permanent-Fund Dividend.  These funds are paid to the residents of Alaska each year.  In 2008, the dividend was over $1,000 per person.

For consumable natural resources, the fairest way to apply the NRT is to tax it once—paid for by the company that extracts the resource. Thus, you would not pay a NRT on the aluminum can of Diet Coke you bought. But the company that extracted bauxite (an aluminum ore) would pay a tax to the federal government on each ton of aluminum it extracted. Of course, the cost of this tax would be passed onto the ultimate consumer, so in this sense those who use the most natural resources are those that pay for them.

In the case of land, only the land owner would be taxed, as a monthly land-tax fee. Note that there would be no NRT on the home or buildings on this land, because the NRT would have been paid previously by the companies that extracted the resources needed to build these structures. 

The legitimacy of this tax is based on the fact that no one has created the land. Thus, if a person or company 'owns' land, they have the right to control who is allowed on it. Therefore, they should pay for this right as a land-tax, which is one part of the NRT. 

Why the Natural-Resource Tax is Efficient

On the practical side, all local governments and some state governments have already established such taxes, usually called property taxes.  Thus, it would be fairly easy to have such a federal property/natural-resource tax as a replacement for the income tax (and Social Security/Medicare taxes, as well).  Ownership of property and natural resources such as land, oil wells, coal mines, etc. are already publicly recorded, so there would be no additional intrusion into our lives as a result of this tax.  It would take no tax attorneys, accountants, tax software, or tax forms to do our taxes.  Individuals that own land and companies that own land or extracts natural resources would be taxed regularly, preferably monthly.  Furthermore, property valuations that have already been done at the state or local level could be used at the federal level, thus avoiding another bureaucracy. 

Other Benefits to having a Natural-Resource Tax

There are many other benefits to a natural-resource tax.  For instance, today some of those who are wealthy can often live off tax-sheltered investments and pay virtually no tax.  With an NRT, those who are well-to-do would naturally pay more taxes than those who are not, because they would use more natural resources.  Own five homes?  No problem, but you'll be paying taxes on each lot that the homes are built upon, and would be indirectly paying for the natural resources used to build the homes.

It is important to reiterate that home owners (as well as owners of other buildings) would pay an NRT only on the land that their home sits upon and not upon the building itself.  Thus, in a given subdivision, all lots that are substantially the same would have the same taxable value and the tax assessors would not have to be concerned with the value of the home itself.  This would encourage people to build and maintain nice homes, since they don't have to worry about their taxes going up because of improvements they make.

Also, it would be fair to tax farm land, residential lots, and commercial lots at different rates, given their various uses.

Life would be easier on farmers as well.  They would only be taxed on their land and not on their profit.  Thus they would be encouraged to make the best use of the land they have.  There would be no incentive to not grow crops as there is now in some cases.

Because people naturally want to minimize their taxes, a wonderful side effect of an NRT is that if people want to save on taxes, they only need to consume fewer natural resources. This then encourages the use of more energy-efficient cars, homes, and buildings, and encourages recycling as well. 

The Natural-Resource Tax Dividend

And finally, but importantly, just as with Alaska's Permanent-Fund Dividend that is given to the people of Alaska from oil companies, the federal government could give all citizens and legal residents an NRT Dividend to compensate them for others' use of natural resources.  This would be a fair and just thing to do, and it would be an equitable way to assist the poor (and everyone else).  If done right, this NRT Dividend could replace all subsidies that the government gives out (except for the Health-Care Subsidy and Education Subsidy to be discussed in other posts), saving the taxpayer money from the reduced bureaucracy of administering hundreds of different subsidies.  The amount of this subsidy can be debated, but I'd like for it to be around $1000 per month per adult citizen or permanent resident of the U.S., adjusted each year for inflation.  We could encourage the more prosperous among us to refuse this subsidy, which would help keep the price down. (In order to keep the budget balanced, this amount of this natural resources dividend could be defined as 10% of the Gross Domestic Product - GDP).


Another Benefit of the Natural-Resource Tax Dividend

As time goes on, fewer and fewer low-skilled workers will be needed due to automation. The NRT Dividend will assist those by providing a base income to all. And no matter how much extra money they earn, this Dividend will never be taken away.

Conclusion

In summary, let's replace the income tax and FICA taxes with user fees, taxes on pollution, and a natural-resource tax.  It is the fair and just thing to do, and will create a cleaner environment and a more prosperous nation.

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Tim Farage is a Senior Lecturer in the Computer Science Department at The University of Texas at Dallas. The opinions expressed herein are those of the author. You are welcome to comment upon this blog entry and/or to contact him at tfarage@hotmail.com.
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Government Based Upon Natural Law - (Part 3) - The Income Tax is Bad Idea

Unintended Consequences of the Income Tax 

Ever since the IRS was established, people have complained about its abuses. Many bills have been passed in Congress in the hope they will correct some of these abuses. Unfortunately, any fix is doomed to fail.

It is not the IRS but Congress that has established a tax on income. (At least they even did it the right way – we passed a Constitutional Amendment that allowed Congress to tax income. Sadly, this was the one of the worst amendments ever passed). It was Congress that has modified a tax code that initially levied a 1% tax on those with above-average income to a tax code that is over a million words in length and that literally no one understands. The IRS is authorized by Congress to enforce this code and to collect such taxes. Since some people will try to hide income in order to avoid paying income tax, the IRS naturally tries to find these people. Is it a surprise that the IRS has a computer database that stores information about us? Or that they can use this database to check to see if someone's purchases correspond to his or her reported income? Or that they monitor cash deposits over $10,000? Most of us don't like this, and we shouldn't. But it's not the fault of the IRS. The problem is the income tax itself.

Taxing income is bad for a large variety of reasons. It has been estimated that it costs the American people between $200 - $600 billion dollars each year for the tax attorneys, accountants, record keeping, books, software, etc., just to comply with the tax code and minimize their taxes. This does not include the millions of hours we waste each year in tax related activities.

The income tax is arbitrary and frequently counterproductive as far as what deductions are allowed. For instance, you can deduct day care expenses from your income tax, but if a mother chooses to not work outside the home, no deduction is available. Congress uses deductions as a way to encumber us to them and they are loathe to make major changes. There are so many deductions we think we depend on, that we'll vote for whoever will maintain or increase them. Woe is he who runs for office and who wants to eliminate popular deductions. Furthermore, many prosperous individuals pay very little income taxes.

Another issue is that having to report income to the government is an invasion of privacy. Should it really be the government's business how much money we earn, where we earn it, or how far we drive while earning it?

Because of the complexity of the tax code, taxpayers must concern themselves with taxable events, such as selling stock or property. The economy is distorted and less efficient when we make decisions based upon whether or not a taxable event will occur rather than what we think would be a good use for our money.

Income tax law is even at fault for abridging freedom of speech. How can that be? Section 501(c)(3) of the IRS code grants certain not-for-profit organizations, including churches, a status that allows them not to pay income tax. However, it also prohibits such organizations from making political endorsements, and it stipulates that nonprofits should spend no substantial part of their activities in carrying on propaganda, or otherwise attempting to influence legislation. Such organizations may not participate in, or intervene in any political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office. The IRS has investigated and is still investing churches who they think might be violating 501(c)(3) code. This is frightening to those of us who believe in free speech. The point here is that if there was no income tax, there would be no such IRS code controlling the free speech of non-profit organizations.

Unjustness of the Income Tax

But the biggest reason against a tax on income is that it is unjust.

An income tax is unjust because it has nothing to do with fees charged for services provided by the government. What government service does a person use just because he or she is earning money? To clarify this point, imagine two people who have the same job and earn the same salary during the day. At night, one of them watches TV and the other does marriage counseling out of his home. Is there any rational reason that the second person should pay more taxes that the first? No, because the counselor is certainly not benefiting any more than the TV watcher from government services. Taxing the counselor more than the TV watcher is tantamount to discouraging him or her from counseling. As a matter of fact, the income tax is unjust for the same reasons that the tax on polluters is just. We should tax polluters because of the harm they cause; and this tax discourages them from polluting. We should not tax people for working, since people who work are clearly benefiting our country. Taxing their productivity is precisely the wrong thing to do for such taxes discourage work! 

So let's replace the income tax (and FICA taxes, too). No more tax on wages and salary, no more wasting time, money and human intelligence trying to minimize or avoid paying income taxes and complying with an impossible-to-understand tax code. No more intrusion into our personal lives. No more taxing productivity. No more tax forms to fill out or tax audits to go to.

Of course, the government has many legitimate needs, and there will have to be some kinds of taxes to pay for them. What taxes are fair and just?

You can find out in my next blog entry, "Government based upon Natural Law - (Part 4) -The Natural Resource Tax".

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Tim Farage is a Senior Lecturer in the Computer Science Department at The University of Texas at Dallas. The views expressed here are those of the author. You are welcome to comment upon this blog entry and/or to contact him at tfarage@hotmail.com.
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Government Based Upon Natural Law – (Part 2) – Appointment of Supreme Court Justices and Limits on Congressional Authority

Appointment of Justices 

Only Supreme Court Justices who are strict constructionists should be appointed - those who will interpret the Constitution as it is currently amended - not as they would like it to be. 

There are certainly times when many of us have wished that the Constitution would have granted more (or fewer) powers to Congress.  But these powers of Congress should be changed only through the amendment process given in the Constitution and not by judicial fiat.

Powers of Congress

Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution enumerates the powers of Congress – in what areas Congress is able to legislate.  Reading this section shows how few areas in which Congress is able to create legislation.

Most areas have to do with the military.  Some of the other more important areas have to do with the:

-   Ability to lay and collect taxes

-   To coin money, and borrow money

-   To regulate commerce between the States and between foreign countries

-   To establish post offices and postal roads

-   To establish rules for copyrights and patents

Furthermore, a number of the Bill of Rights amendments further restrict Congress and explicitly indicate that Congress only has the powers granted to it by the Constitution:

-   Amendment I forbids Congress from passing laws involving religious expression; freedom of speech; freedom of the press; the right of the people to peaceably assemble; and to petition the government for grievances.

-   Amendment II forbids Congress from passing laws from infringing on the right of the people to own and bear arms.  (This is an aspect of the Natural Right we have to defend ourselves, our families, and or countries).

-   Amendment III starts with, “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, house, papers and effects, shall not be violated by Congress, except upon probable cause, which must be determined by a judge".

-   Amendment IX states, “The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”  In other words, people have thousands of rights, and they could not possibly be enumerated in the Constitution.

-   And Amendment X states, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited to it by the States, are reserved to the to the States respectively, or to the people.

It is certainly clear that the Constitution explicitly limited the powers of Congress.  Clearly, Congress has far exceeded its Constitutional mandates.  A good Supreme Court would have struck down many of these laws. 

Examples of a Law that Violate the Constitution 

Probably the most devastating laws passed by Congress have to do drug laws.  Look as hard as you wish and you will find that Congress has no authority to pass such laws.  It is not the place to go into it here, but so many of our citizens have been arrested for such laws that it is a disgrace.  For further information see Michelle Alexander’s excellent book, “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness." 

As proof that such law are unconstitutional, when Congress wanted to make alcohol illegal (Prohibition), they knew that they had no authority to do this, and instead proposed a Constitutional amendment, which passed, but was soon overturned.  Nanny-state laws have no place in the United States of America, a country based upon the freedom to live in peace.

Examples of Supreme Court Decisions that Violated the Constitution

A famous example of a Supreme Court decision that violated the Constitution was to not allow students to lead prayer groups before or after school, with students who voluntarily attended. This was a clear violation of the First Amendment.

Another series of Supreme Court decisions that violated the Constitution allowed for the "separate but equal" treatment of whites and “coloreds”.  For instance, in Plessy v. Ferguson the ruling required railway companies carrying passengers in their coaches to provide equal, but separate, accommodations for the white and colored races.  The "separate but equal" doctrine applied to railroad cars and to schools, voting rights, and drinking fountains.  However, there was nothing “equal” about these decisions, and they were finally overturned in Brown vs. The Board of Education.

A final example is a Supreme Court ruling about the Ten Commandments.

Here various Supreme Courts have come up with conflicting decisions about this. First, keep in mind that the Supreme Court building has the Ten Commandments inscribed in stone in at least three places.  How could they then rule that other public institutions could not do so?

It is a mystery to me. Displaying the Ten Commandments in a public building has been done since the founding of our country and was certainly not found unconstitutional then. Why now? After all, the display of any text does not ‘establish a religion’ which meant that the US would have an official religion.

Even displaying the words, God forbid, “We love Satan”, would not be unconstitutional, although I, and many other would not walk into such a building.

Suggestions

A Constitutional amendment should be passed that requires Congress to cite the part of the Constitution that gives them the authority to pass a given law.

A Constitutional amendment should be passed that requires Congress to pass laws that have no more words that there are in the Constitutional itself. This would stop the ridiculous laws such as the Income Tax Laws that have over 2 million words in them. What Congressman or person can read a law with hundreds or thousands of pages, which is not uncommon.

The Constitution should be amended to require a balanced budget.  A government that lives within its means does not pass on its debt to our children, who must pay it off with interest.  Such an amendment would force our legislators to make difficult decisions regarding spending and taxes, and not be able to cut taxes and increase spending just to get more votes.  The amendment should include a provision so that, in an emergency, Congress may spend more than permitted if two-thirds of both Houses vote to do so.

This may be hard to believe, but the Congressional Budget Office estimates that the national debt will be around $17 trillion for the 2013 fiscal year.  This is quite a bit over $100,000 of debt per family!  Each year we must pay the interest on this debt, and the debt and interest has been growing under every almost every administration since 1969. Additionally, the Constitution should be amended so that any tax or spending increases over and above those due to inflation and population growth must be approved by a 2/3rds vote of both houses of Congress.

The clauses in the Constitution that give Congress the ability to pass laws in certain areas are called the “enumerated powers”.  The 10th Amendment gives the states and the people the ability to pass laws in other areas.

By helping to control federal spending and by reducing deficit spending, the three items above will help to keep Congress and the President from inserting themselves into the lives of the people any more than is necessary. And this means that we the people have more freedom to live our lives and practice our beliefs as we see fit.

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Tim Farage is a Senior Lecturer and Graduate Adviser in the Computer Science Department at The University of Texas at Dallas. The views expressed herein are those of the author. You are welcome to comment upon this blog entry and/or to contact him at tfarage@hotmail.com.

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My Top Seven Wishes for what Congress can do for our Country

Introduction
 
I tend not to think of politics in terms of political parties, because most politicians that are Republicans or Democrats have as their main priority getting elected or getting re-elected. They do this by voting for legislation that they know is bad for the country, but good for keeping them and their party in office. How else do you explain a budget deficit of $13.6 trillion, or over $40 trillion in unfunded liabilities, or having military bases that even the military doesn't want?
 
So what should Congress do that would put the country before their own interests? Here is my Top Seven List of what Congress should do to improve our country and keep it as the best country in the world. How did I come up with number seven? I could come up with 100, but that would be overwhelming. But these seven are the most important. Besides, I like the number seven.
 
1) Pass a balanced-budget amendment
 
Year after year of budget deficits tells us that Congress cannot balance a budget. The $13.6 trillion national debt mentioned above comes out to over $120,000 of national debt per family. Did you know that you had that debt on top of whatever personal debts you have?
 
It's time for a balanced-budget amendment that requires Congress to pass only balanced budgets. The amendment should have an exception that allows for Congress to vote to deficit spend for a given year if 2/3rds of both houses vote to do so. This is needed in times of war, or a large natural disaster.
 
2) Real health care reform
 
Medicare, Medicaid, and 2,500 page health care plan that just passed are underfunded by over $40 trillion. And they don't provide health care for everyone, they don't remove the pre-existing condition problem that everyone hates, and they still tie much of health care with employment. Yet we spend about 16% of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on health care.
 
Here's a simple solution that provides health care to all Americans, would be completely funded, would eliminate the pre-existing condition problem, and would de-couple health care with employment. The solution is for the federal government to take 10% of GDP, about $1.5 trillion, and put an equal amount of this into a Medical Care Account (MCA) for each American adult. This would be about $600 per month per adult. About half of this would be used to buy a high-deductible health insurance policy, and the other half to pay for medical expenses incurred before the deductible kicks in (and in most years, it wouldn't).
 
Insurance companies that grant policies under this plan must agree to cover any children the adult might have.

This plan would also replace all other health care subsidies.
 
I'll go into more detail in a future post, but that's the essence of it. Everyone would be covered, everyone could still choose whatever doctor or hospital they wished, and we'd save money all at the same time.
 
3) Bring our troops home
 
It's hard to believe but we have more than 350,000 troops deployed overseas in over 150 countries. I want the US to always have the best military in the world, yet I see no reason to have troops deployed overseas unless we are at war. Iraq didn't attack us, and Afghanistan didn't attack us. Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda did. So the only troops we should have overseas right now would be those who go after bin Laden and those members of Al Qaeda who are planning to attack us. And most of this can be done with our Special Forces and our intelligence apparatus, which have been especially effective since 9/11 in thwarting attacks against us by Al Qaeda.
 
If we did this, we'd need fewer troops, we'd have less hostility directed at us, and we could use some of the troops brought home to protect our borders and ports. I think we would actually have fewer attacks directed against us without troops stationed overseas.
 
And the US Navy still dominates the oceans, and can defend the US from attacks from just about anywhere in the world.
 
4) Transform Social Security into a sustainable retirement plan
 
Social Security was started by FDR in 1935 and the tax rate was 2%. It was meant to be a supplement to one's retirement income. Now the Social Security tax rate is 12.4%, and it is still only a supplement to one's income. And it's underfunded. Anyone saving 12.4% of their income should be able to retire on that alone. Instead, to retire gracefully, we need to have another retirement plan and save 10% in that. This is an incredible waste.
 
Transition to a system in which individuals are required to save 15% for their retirement. No more underfunding. And if I told you that most people would be millionaires when they retired, you wouldn't believe me, but it's true.  The transition might take decades, but the sooner we start, the better off we'll be.
 
Every month each of us would have more money to spend because we wouldn't have to put money into both Social Security and another retirement plan.
 
5) Replace the income tax with a Natural Resource and Pollution tax
 
We currently waste between $200 - $600 billion per year just because there's an income tax. This is money spent on tax attorneys, tax accountants, tax software, etc., just to pay income taxes. Furthermore, there is no rational basis for a tax on income. If a person earns X amount of money, then that money is theirs and no one else's.
 
On the other hand the natural resources of a country weren't created by anyone, so they can only be considered to belong to all of us. The best way to handle the natural resources is to allow individuals or companies who own them to pay a monthly tax on those resources that are not used up (mostly land) or to pay a one-time tax on resources that are used up, such as oil, gas, and minerals.
 
This would eliminate the IRS and all the problems created by having an income tax, and replace it with a tax that would have many beneficial side effects, such as encouraging conservation in order to minimize taxes.
 
6) Start building nuclear reactors now
 
We need inexpensive, reliable energy to be prosperous. Inexpensive energy is one of the single most important items that help the poor get out of poverty, because inexpensive energy reduces the cost of everything. Currently, there is only one source of non-polluting, reliable energy that can provide a steady base load of energy for our country. And that is energy generated from nuclear power. President Obama is providing loan guarantees to investors who provide money to build nuclear reactors. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has already approved two very good and very safe nuclear reactor designs. Congress just needs to remove any other remaining barriers to building them now.
 
In a decade or so, we'll have better battery-powered cars, and these can be charged with electricity generated by nuclear-powered plants. We'll then have most of of our energy be clean and safe. They also give off no CO2, and will make us independent of foreign oil.
 
If you're worried about radiation from them, don't be. In over 50 years, there has not been even a single death due to radiation in the United States as a result of commercial nuclear power plants.
 
7) Allowing all parents to choose their children's school
 
This is really a state issue, but it's so important that I'm including it here.
 
Currently, if you are well-to-do, you can send your child to whatever school you wish, if that school is willing to enroll your child. If you are not well off, you must send your child to the local public school, or possibly a public charter school. We've been trying for decades to improve public education, and everyone knows how that has gone. If you don't know, go see the documentary, Waiting for Superman.
 
The documentary shows the plight of the poor and how desperate they are to get into good schools. The writer suggests having more charter schools, which is fine. But the only sustainable answer is to have school choice for all parents, rich or poor. There is no doubt that it will eventually happen, so why not start doing it now? If we are going to subsidize education, then allow the parents the freedom to decide how their children are to be educated.
 
It's simple to do. Each state should take whatever it now spends on K-12 education. (In Texas it's about $9,000 per student per year). Then put this amount into an Educational Benefit Account for each child. The child's parents can then use this money to send their child to whatever public, private or parochial school that they feel will best suit their child. And they can change schools whenever they wish.
 
School's will crop up all over the place. Some will be bad and some will be good. But the bad ones will eventually go out of business, since parents will stop sending their children there. And that's what will lead to educational improvement in our country.
 
Conclusion
 
If Congress would do the above items, our country would once again be leading the way to making a better world for all.
 
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Tim Farage is a Senior Lecturer in the Computer Science Department at The University of Texas at Dallas. You are welcome to comment upon this blog entry and/or to contact him at tfarage@hotmail.com.
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