Reason: “a tax cut is not a handout. It simply means government steals less. What progressives want to do is take money from some—by force—and spend it on others. It sounds less noble when plainly stated. That’s the moral side of the matter. There’s a practical side, too. Taxes discourage wealth creation. That hurts everyone”
The September 23, 2010, Playoff PAC press release:
“Playoff PAC, the principal opposition group to college football’s Bowl Championship Series (“BCS”), today filed a 27-page legal complaint (and executive summary) with the Internal Revenue Service against bowl organizations affiliated with the BCS. The complaint and executive summary list significant tax irregularities discovered through a methodical review of over 2,300 pages of tax records and public documents.
The complaint was submitted to the IRS on Playoff PAC’s behalf by Marcus S. Owens, former head of the IRS’s Exempt Organizations Division, and Joseph M. Birkenstock, former Chief Counsel of the Democratic National Committee. Both attorneys are Members of Washington, D.C. law firm Caplin & Drysdale.
Playoff PAC co-founder Chad Pehrson said: ‘BCS Bowls all claim to be ‘501(c)(3)’ public charities—the same tax designation as the American Red Cross—to make their revenues tax-exempt and obtain other taxpayer-funded benefits. Playoff PAC’s review uncovered a disturbing pattern of BCS Bowl organizations using their charitable funds to enrich Bowl executives, pay registered lobbyists without disclosure, fund political campaigns, and heap frivolous benefits on Bowl insiders. The BCS Bowls’ activities raise important concerns under federal tax laws and we anticipate that the IRS will give these issues due attention’.”
The Heritage Foundation published a white paper called “Obama Tax Hikes: Higher Dividend Taxes Hurt Seniors.” Here is the abstract:
“There is much talk in Washington and the media about the impending expiration of the 2001 and 2003 tax relief. Those in favor of letting the tax cuts expire argue that to do otherwise would be merely to reward the rich at the expense of the lower-income population. Lost in these misguided accusations is the fact that higher dividend taxes—part of the tax increase currently scheduled for January 1, 2011—will not only hurt American companies, but penalize America’s senior citizens. Older people hold the most stock of any demographic group, and often rely heavily on dividends to supplement their Social Security income. Penalizing retirees would be one of the particularly bad outcomes of letting the Bush tax cuts expire. Time is running out and Congress should act now to make the tax relief permanent.”
Wall St. Journal: “The White House fights an effort to ease a burden on small business. . . . The Senate will vote on amendments to the White House small business bill that would rescind an ObamaCare mandate that companies track and submit to the IRS all business-to-business transactions over $600 annually. . . . But this ‘tax gap’ of unreported business income is largely a Beltway myth, and no less than the Treasury Department’s National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson says the costs will be ‘disproportionate as compared with any resulting improvements in tax compliance’.”
See “Chambers fighting paperwork mandates included in federal health insurance reforms” and a related story in the New York Times called “Many Push for Repeal of Tax Provision in Health Law” that starts:
“Many Democrats have joined Republicans in pushing for the repeal of a tax provision in the new health care law that imposes a huge information-reporting burden on small businesses.”
See also “Proposal to Repeal Tax Rules Unacceptable, Treasury Says“
More evidence of the rot in Washington and that the public sector exists to pay for high paying benefit laden lifetime jobs and pensions for federal workers. How is it possible that federal workers owe $3.3 billion in back taxes?