Tax Release or Tax Relief

Ron Paul and Mike Huckabee have been throwing around the idea of eliminating the IRS. While this sounds like a wonderful idea, it is a pandering lie that is misleading at best.

One easily noted reason that the IRS will not be disbanded is because it employs 115,000 people across the United States. Even if half of these people were given duties under an alternate system, it would still send over 50,000 Americans into the ranks of the unemployed. Not only will it have politicians haggling over negative job growth, it will put a large strain on the economy to have this many people dumped into the unemployment lines at one time. The money we save in IRS salaries will be absorbed by the additional benefits to be paid to the ex-employees.

The other point to consider is that Congress is the one who decides how taxes are collected and disbursed. Congress benefits greatly under the current system. Since World War II, the House and Senate have worked on increasing their salaries and perks, not on improving the tax system for the good of the citizenry.

A much more effective approach is to seek changes to the general budgetary and financing process. Sadly, it needs to be noted that every government program costs money. Thus, the more programs we can eliminate, the more tax burden we can avoid. The tax codes can be greatly simplified. It should not require an accountant to determine your reasonable share of the national tax.

Simply requiring accountability for every government program and reducing the complexity of the tax codes would allow the IRS to downsize through attrition and free up the money that is currently wasted on bureaucracy.