The Five Steps Below Explain the Math Behind the Solutions on This Site
1 - We're Using the Wrong Tax Base
Historically we've changed taxes as our economy has matured. Today we predominately tax income, even though the income we collectively earn, $20 trillion, represents only a tiny fraction of the total payments in our modern economy.
We should tax the entire economy, not our income.
Our economy is comprised of an astonishing $7,244 trillion in payments as shown in the table.
By tapping such a huge base, we could slash the taxes we pay by 100-fold and yet generate more revenue than we do today.
The Fed publishes this information in the BIS Red Book. Click United States in the link below, and look for Tables CTA1 and CTA2.
2 - The Power of Taxing Payments
If we taxed payments at 0.2%, we could eliminate every single tax we pay today, and yet generate nearly three times the revenue.
3 - The Cost of New Benefits
Here's the cost of funding $24,000/yr in basic income, earned income credits, free healthcare, and free college.
The benefits above would cost $7.5 trillion, but they'd replace $2.7 trillion in spending. The new budget for the federal and all state and local governments would thus total $11.8 trillion.
A 0.2% payments tax would generate $14.5 trillion, so we'd have a $2.6 trillion surplus, as shown in the table.
Here's how low your taxes would be with a payments tax.
You'd no longer have to pay any federal, state, or local income taxes, Social Security taxes, capital gains taxes, sales taxes, or property taxes. And yet you'd receive basic income, free healthcare, and free college.
The math works. This can be done. To learn more about why this is possible today, visit our page on taxation.
