Talk:Income tax/Archive 1

message: I am not sure what this part of the article is supposed to mean:
"An income tax is a tax on net income, which is the difference between gross receipts and expenses."
If you make $2 million, you can't just spend it all and tell the government you don't have any net income, so you owe them nothing.
Please clarify...
69.19.2.225 11:50, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The expenses are those directly attributable to earning those gross receipts. Indeed, the word "income" itself implies that it is net of direct expenses, jguk 12:40, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Net income 

message: I would like to remove the section about legal arguments against taxation to another page. It's very long winded and largely irrelevent since US courts do not recognize such arguemnts as valid.  I would also like to replace the history of top tax rates with median tax rates as that would be more repesetative of the Tax burden in the US. 198.112.236.6 15:52, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed Changes (US Section)

message: Here is the answer to the mystery about the "quote" from Lucas v. Earl at the Irwin Schiff web site at http://irwinschiff.homestead.com
The quote on the Schiff web site, which is falsely attributed to the Court itself, is as follows:
::"The claim that salaries, wages, and conpensation [sic] for personal services are to be taxed as an entirety and therefore must be returned by the individual who has performed the services which produce the gain is without support, either in the language of the Act or in the decisions of the courts construing it. Not only this, but it is directly opposed to provisions of the Act and to regulations of the U.S. Treasury Department, which either prescribed or permits that compensations for personal services not be taxed as a entirety and not be returned by the individual performing the services. It is to be noted that, by the language of the Act, it is not salaries, wages, or compensation for personal services that are to be included in gains, profits, and income derived from salaries, wages, or compensation for personal services."
This is not from the Court’s opinion in Lucas v. Earl. It is an almost direct quote from page 17 of the Respondent’s brief filed with the U.S. Supreme Court in connection with the government's petition for a writ of certiorari. Guy C. Earl, the taxpayer, was the Respondent. The brief was written by Earl’s attorneys: Warren Olney, Jr., J.M. Mannon, Jr., and Henry D. Costigan. In some versions of the case as reported, this statement and other quotes and paraphrases from pages 8, 10, 14, 15, 17, and 18 of the Respondent’s brief are re-printed as a headnote ABOVE the opinion of the Court itself by Justice Holmes. In the case reprints that include this headnote (and many of them don't even show it), these excerpts are not clearly identified as being from the brief, so a non-lawyer could easily miss the point that this verbiage, like any headnote or syllabus, is not part of the Court’s opinion. As every tax lawyer knows, Mr. Earl lost the case.
Oh well, here's the score: Tax law 99,999, tax protesters zero. 
Famspear 22:51, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Editor's note: No, correct as usual! The case of Joe Bannister (or Banister) was a criminal tax case. The defendant was acquitted of certain Federal criminal tax charges. The court in the Banister case did not rule that the Federal income tax laws are invalid. The court also did not rule that wages are not taxable, etc., etc. In criminal tax cases, as in murder cases, some defendants are convicted and others are acquitted. The mere fact that someone is acquitted of a charge of murder does not mean that the court ruled the murder statute to be invalid. Murder is still against the law. Yours, Famspear 16:50, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

text: For corn's sake, BB69, listen to yourself talk - "as usual, the missapplied tax protestors are correct and the Supreme Court is wrong". Well, the Supreme Court is the body constitutionally empowered to interpret the Constitution and laws, not the "missapplied tax protestors", so I'm going to go with the Court on this one. Also, Congress - which has the power to pass these laws - has not passed any clarifications or done anything to suggest that the Court has got it wrong; and the President, who ultimately oversees the IRS and is constitutionally bound to enforce the Constitution and laws, has gone ahead and collected those taxes. So perhaps there is indeed a conspiracy - a conspiracy by the majority of the population in this democratic society to impose a tax on the wages earned by the whole of the population, in order to pay for the roads, the parks, the border patrol, the War in Iraq, subsidies for oil companies, and whatever else our elected representatives choose to throw our money at. If you want to get out of the clutches of this conspiracy, you can always renounce your citizenship in this "corrupt" country and move to Tonga. bd2412 T 17:09, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Can we leave corn out of it BD2412? Yes, listen to me talk. The Supreme Court is not above the Constitution. I'll go with the Constitution on this one. Have you ever thought that Congress has something to gain from not overturning the Justices that they have elected? I mean really, I would like to see you out of your sheepish stance for once and take a look at what The Constitution says about direct taxes and tell me what you think that really means. The marjority of the population in this democratic soceity do not impose on their wages earned. They go along with whatever is told to them, not remembering that the constitution says that isn't supposed to happen and that an excise tax is collected to pay for the roads, etc. I intend to get out of the clutches of this conspiracy by making them adhere to the law as it is. The law is fine as is, it is just being misapplied. If you would like to be taxed illegally and give up your wages, feel free to, but do not push your beliefs on others who like to keep their constitutional right to keep their monies. BB69 Talk 05:15, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: ''Lucas v. Earl'' continued: The mysterious quote that isn't there 

message: Corporation Tax Act of 1909, the Court described income as the GAIN DERIVED from capital, from labor, or from both combined, inclusive of the profit gained through a sale or conversion of capital assets not ON capital from labor. (emphasis added)206.111.181.109 19:01, 7 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Corporation Tax Act

message: Since there have been no challenges, I have updated the section on the article and marked it Tax Honesty Movement. Please do not remove or edit the article until we have discussed it on the discussion page first. Thank youbb69 17:54, 10 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The tax protester position is very marginal.  Although it is worth mentioning, it is not worth spending a large amount of space on in the main Income tax article. Citing scads of irrelevant judicial opinions without context is besides the point. --Macrakis 18:37, 10 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Tax Honesty Movement addition/edit

message: I have removed this information until it can be agreed upon how to print it balanced and complete or not at all. bb69 16:55, 11 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removed Tax Protestor Text

message: I feel that we should avoid using commercial sites as external links whenever possible.  In this instance, there is no reason to go through the Turbo Tax site to reach the IRS site -- that can be reached directly. Robert A.West (Talk) 20:00, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikipedia is not Advertising 

message: I've added a section on Income tax in India, linking to the main article (which at this point is sorely lacking in content). Over the next few days I will enhance that page as well. Deepakshenoy 12:20, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Income Tax in India 

message: I think that all the countries listing in section #3 should be organized alphabetically. Any objections?
--GurufromIndia 10:18, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Good point - Done Morphh (talk) 13:53, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Countries in section organized 

message: Per WP:MOSHEAD, we should avoid restating the subject of the article or of an enclosing section in heading titles. It is assumed that you are writing about the same subject, so you usually do not need to refer to it again. For example, "Principles of Income Tax" -> "Principles", "History of Income Tax" -> "History", "Income tax in the United States" -> "United States".  Since this could be consider a major change, I figured I would post for discussion.  Thoughts?  Morphh (talk) 14:01, 5 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I went ahead and made this change. Morphh (talk) 13:54, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Headers

message: Can we add a section on Spain to the article — it had no income tax till the fall of Franco, which is very recent for a 'Modern Western European country'. What other countries don't rely on income tax so much? Njál 13:00, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure - Is there a main article on the Spain Income Tax?  If not, perhaps someone could write a something up to include. Morphh (talk) 13:56, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: As far as other countries not relying on the income tax - I'm not sure that has a place in this article.  I'm not even sure the section "Countries with no personal income tax" should exist in this article. If a country that is notable has an income tax, we should include them so I don't see why we should have a list of those that don't.  Morphh (talk) 14:10, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the list of countries wihout income tax is valuable — for one thing it tells us there's no need for a section on income tax in that country. It could be relegated to another page, though. Njál 14:50, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: At the least, I think we should put it into a multi-column format. Morphh (talk) 16:38, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spain 

message: Good catch. Morphh. The direct tax is that paid by the employee. JQ 23:24, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Non-obvious vandalism 

message: The following material has been moved from the article to this talk page:
::U.S. States that do not report income to the Federal Government. Doesn't not include other taxes ex. property tax,sales tax,inheritence taxation. 
::Delaware
::Las Vegas
::Oregon
::U.S. States where Federal Income taxation is not paid by resident or employer.
::Oregon
::U.S. Virgin Islands where a tax sumpliment [sic] is charged for residents on expenses.
First of all, it's unclear what is meant by the phrase U.S. States that do not "report income" to the Federal government. State governments generally don't have to pay Federal income tax on their own income, so it's unclear what was intended here. Second, Las Vegas is not a state. Third, none of this information is sourced.
Federal tax -- especially Federal income tax -- is most certainly paid by both residents and employers in Oregon.
The verbiage on the Virgin Islands is also enigmatic. A tax "sumpliment" (supplement, maybe?)? Charged "on expenses"? What is this all about? Yours, Famspear 15:46, 3 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: FYI, the user who added that has made several odd edits relating to Oregon.  Katr67 16:44, 3 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Unsourced, incorrect material moved from article

message: Substituted at 15:01, 1 May 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: Assessment comment