These depressing facts are supplied by Amity Shlaes of The Wall Street Journal. Consider the experience of John and Barbara Zwynenburg. When in December 1988 their son was killed in the terrorist bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, they expected some sort of settlement from Pan Am. Such anecdotes usefully get the public's dander up, but they concern episodes less injurious to the public than are the broad consequences of tax policies. The family that owns, say, a Burger King franchise, which is valuable but does not generate a large cash flow, may have to sell it to pay the tax on the value of it.
Job creation is hurt by the payroll tax.
High property taxes intended to fund good schools drive away affluent homeowners, depress property values and hurt schools. And so it goes. Shlaes twice cites former Treasury Secretary William Simon's acerbic remark that America should have a tax system that looks as though someone designed it on purpose. For that class, amending the tax code amounts to appropriating by other means. Every wrinkle in the code was put there to please some constituency, which becomes attentive to the defense of the favor.