The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It

Author - Amity Shlaes ... [Goo?] [Posters]

This Paperback Book item from Harvest Books was reviewed on 11-Dec-2008.

Search ISBN:0156011522 offer from Abebooks or used books from Alibris. The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It Reference Book. Classifications : General Taxes Accounting Industries & Professions Business & Investing Subjects Books International Taxes Accounting Industries & Professions Business & Investing Subjects Books Personal Taxes Taxes A . Click the following link to view the cover of The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It.

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1) Paperback Book The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It by Harvest Books. Yes, gov´t needs to be halved - then again, and then again! America has become a land of gov´t/tax parasites enforcing their bloated payrolls and pension deals on us "others - outside the castle." Throw them out.¤

2) Paperback Book The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It by Harvest Books. Equalization tax policies directly forcing tax payers redistribute educational monies equally on education. Equalization does not work. It´s a socialistic virus starting in Wilmington, Delaware and moved to Maine in 1970 and eventually hit Texas. The most important question facing tax payers is can equality of education spending buy equal performance? The truth suggests the more money pumped into a school has no direct correlation in producing better students. Equalization did not improve test scores. Force distribution of wealth never works.

The Vermont Supreme Court declared local tax policy paying for local school funding as unconstitutional. The court ruled it is not alright to spend more money for one student than another. The racial discrimination protection provided in Brown verse the Board of Education was wrongly applied to economic equality for education. It is wrong because education equality is not a constitutional protected right. The old system made available local taxes paying for ¾ of the cost of school. Money was collected locally and sent to the state and $5,000 returned for each student. Forced equal spending was supported by the Democrats and opposed by the Republicans with Governor Howard Dean supporting equalization.

In 1997, Vermont passed Act 60 generating tax policy effecting 251 towns, splitting the town into two groups: receiving towns (receivers of tax benefits) and senders (receivers of tax cuts). The impact was immediately felt; Dorset received a double property tax portion, Montpelier exposed $680 million dollars in property tax to change, Stratton and Winhall were hit the hardest with a seven fold increase in property tax.

In Serrano verses Priest the court ruled that parts of California must spend about the same amount per pupil. The court case ended local property tax and started plans to force richer neighborhoods to support poorer neighborhoods. Proposition 13 was a defensive measure by citizens too put a tax cap against rising property taxes and set off a national tax cutting effort leading to the Tax Reform Act of 1986 by Ronald Reagan.

Serrano went against traditional school funding structure. Historically, most State Constitutions defined school funding to be provided by local taxes. Here is an excerpt: "A school or schools shall be established in each town by the legislature, for the convenient instruction of youth, with such salaries to the masters to be paid by the town, making proper use of school lands in each town, thereby to enable them to instruct youth a low price." Bottom line, local taxes spent locally is acceptable. It is acceptable because the individual can see what their money has bought and if people don´t like what they see, a tax cut will occur. The PTA attempts to reconnect parents to the value added for their child´s education. In 1990, $30 million in charitable gifts were funneled through the PTA. If reconnection fails forced tax equalization will have devastating impact on the public system. If money can´t buy performance and if complex qualification terms for school monies drive administers into a rat maze, parent will start to examine methods to take back control. Small towns will replace public schools with private schools. Towns are competing for families through their schools, parks, and safety assurances. People will pay money, if they believe their children are getting a desired quality of education, if they don´t get the expected education value, they will move to towns were they can get a quality education. People vote with their feet, the Tiebout theory advocated by Charles Tiebout, in 1950.
¤

3) Paperback Book The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It by Harvest Books. I just don´t understand how it´s considered "greedy" for me to want to keep all of the money I have worked to earn -- but it´s somehow NOT greedy and/or lazy and/or selfish for someone to want the government to provide his health care (or pay him when he is unemployed) with money that has simply been confiscated from some other person who performed the work to earn that money. Can somebody explain that to me, please?¤

4) Paperback Book The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It by Harvest Books. As the title says this is silly, political posturing by
someone who has hers and doesn´t particularly care if people
are out of work. Maybe she doesn´t care if you´re on the dole.¤

5) Paperback Book The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It by Harvest Books. When George Washington was president, taxes were few. Since then, times have really gotten expensive. The 20th century especially was an arms race between the governments in the United States and its citizens to determine who would control the citizens´ income. Government was on the offense and the citizens were on the defense. The citizens lost to date. Taxes went from less than 5 percent of income to 40 percent over that time. Most would agree that we cannot afford another century like that one.

This book nicely lays out the history of taxes that take more income and waste a lot of time and effort in the process. The author looks at sales taxes, withholding taxes at work, the marriage penalty in the income tax, whether the housing deduction for interest and taxes is a good thing or not, the problems with taxes on domestic help, property taxes and school support, the social security system, and estate taxes.

She doesn´t like much of what she sees, and is concerned that reform could simply lead to adding new types of taxes (like a national sales tax while keeping all of the old taxes).

The newer the tax or tax idea, it seems like the worse it is working.

Her solutions are basically principles to be followed in reforming taxes. I doubt if they will be followed anytime soon. Recent polls show that most Americans are concerned about paying off the national debt and fixing social security before doing anything about cutting taxes.

Although most of her observations were good ones, I was a little doubtful about her automatic focus on the high income people being taken to the cleaners unfairly. There was not as much attention paid to benefits that lower income people may be receiving.

If you spend time thinking about how to keep your tax bill down, there´s not much new in this book. If you are new to all of the ways that government helps you spend your money, this is a good introduction to the subject.

The book is well written and pleasant to read. The only drawback I found was that it was a little depressing to be reminded of how much I actually pay to all of the various governments. Every year, I find April 15 more and more depressing.¤

6) Paperback Book The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It by Harvest Books. Ever since Colonial times, Americans have been bedeviled by high taxes that seem to return little of material value to citizens. Taking a page from Thomas Paine´s "Greedy Hand" manifesto, Amity Shlaes has written a provocative and fascinating book exposing the inequities of our present tax system, and offers concrete, coherent solutions to simplify our lives. Today, taxes make up more than a third of our economy, the highest level in peacetime history. We truly live in the land Paine foresaw when he warned of government "thrusting itself into every corner and crevice of industry." This book is a cultural examination of the way taxes influence our behavior, and how they force us into an arbitrary system that punishes families and individual enterprise. Shlaes shows how so-called tax breaks do little to help families and how married women are unfairly taxed more. She uncovers the problems that engage and enrage us, proving that Social Security issues and school inadequacies are at heart tax problems. And she charts a course out of the madness of tax oppression, offering a number of solutions that will give each of us a fairer, simpler system. With compassion for Americans and their dreams, Shlaes makes the best case yet for rethinking our tax code.
¤

7) Paperback Book The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It by Harvest Books. Americans are being taxed to death--literally, says author Amity Shlaes in The Greedy Hand. At work or out shopping, upon marriage or even after death, we are paying more in taxes than ever before, according to Shlaes, a Wall Street Journal editorial writer. The average family with two wage-earners is now seeing almost 40 percent of its money go to local, state, and federal taxes. "The greedy hand of government"--first described by American revolutionary Thomas Paine--is greedier than ever, creating a situation ripe for tax reform, if not revolt, Shlaes writes. "We think of our forefathers who felt compelled to rebel against the Crown for ´imposing Taxes on us without our consent.´ We know we live in a democracy, and so must have chosen this arrangement. Yet nowadays we find ourselves feeling that taxes are imposed on us ´without our consent´," she writes.

Chapter by chapter, and in great detail, Shlaes analyzes the tremendous burdens imposed by a wide range of taxes. She assails the marriage penalty, for example, and exposes problems with Social Security and the estate tax. And she documents how Americans feel increasingly unhappy with what government does with their money and shows how people go to great lengths to avoid taxes--driving across state lines to escape a sales tax, for instance. Shlaes calls for political leaders to overhaul the nation´s tax code and suggests starting with guiding principles like the following: "Taxes have to be simple;" "Taxes have to be lower;" and "It´s time to privatize Social Security." The Greedy Hand warns that the tax system damages the economy and hurts working people, and is a good read for anyone who wants to rail intelligently about taxes. --Dan Ring¤

Page Updated: Robert N. Goolsby, 8-Jan-2009, 01560115229780156011525, 280-220-070-2X0-410-190-940-851-8

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