digital emunction

Anything David Cay Johnston writes for the New York Times is worth reading, and his article today on the Congressional testimony of Nina E. Olson, the national taxpayer advocate, is no exception. In the space of a single two-column article, he gives us more hard information than we can get in a week’s worth of primary-season punditry. In today’s article we learn that:

1/ Olson has proposed “apology payments” ranging from $100 to $1000 that would be used to compensate taxpayers who endure “excessive expense or undue burden” on their time as a result of I.R.S. mistakes.

2/ The government could collect $100 billion or more in taxes on the cash economy by tracking credit card payments, state sales tax reports, and other records.

3/ The use of private tax collectors may cost more money than it brings in: [Read more]

Photo by Jason Reed.

From Warren Buffett’s testimony before the Senate Finance Committee yesterday:

A meaningful estate tax is needed to prevent our democracy from becoming a dynastic plutocracy.

Source: “Tax Cuts Increased Income, but Hardly Equally” by David Cay Johnston in today’s NYT.

Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa, Italy’s Minister of Economy and Finance, in an interview with Rai 3’s “In mezz’ora”:

“Anti-tax polemics are irresponsible. We should have the courage to say that taxes are a beautiful and civilized thing, a way for everyone to contribute to indispensible goods like health care, security, education, and the environment.”