Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich–and Cheat Everybody Else
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- ISBN13: 9781591840695
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Product Description
One of the country’s top investigative reporters reveals how the richest people within the top 1 percent of the country has rigged the tax code and additional laws in its favor.
Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter David Cay Johnston has been breaking pieces of this tale on the front page of The New York Times for nine years, work for which one business school professor calls him ìthe de facto chief tax enforcement officer of the United Statesî. With Perfectly Officially authorized, he puts the whole shocking narrative together in a way that will stir up media attention and make readers mad about the state of our country. And he has sound advice on what to do.
Since the mid-1970s, there has been a dramatic shift in who benefits from the American economy and bears the burden of taxes. CEOs, huge investors and business owners can delay paying their taxes for years and sometimes escape them nearly entirely, while wage earners have their taken from each paycheck. Discreet lobbying by the political donor class has made tax policies and enforcement a disaster. Because of obligations to these donors Washington has been unable, or unwilling, to fix these problems. The news media have largely ignored official favors to persons who are supposed to pay the corporate income tax, the estate tax, and the gift tax. Millions of families expecting tax cuts are losing some or all of them to a stealth tax that was originally enacted only to apply to the tax-avoiding rich, but that now stings single mothers building as small as $28,000. But the cumulative results are remarkable: the 400 richest Americans pay a smaller share of their income in taxes than a name building $100,000. The 400 richest pay less and less of their income in taxes while the middle class pays more and more. And while the incomes of the very rich skyrocketed over three decades, the average income for the bottom 90 percent fell.
Johnston exposes exactly how the middle class is being squeezed to make a widening income gap that threatens the stability of the country. By relating the compelling tales of real people across all areas of society, he reveals the truth behind:
* “middle class” tax cuts and exactly whom they benefit
* how workers are being cheated out of their retirement plans while disgraced CEOs walk away with hundreds of millions
* how some corporations avoid paying any federal income tax
* how CEOs glide on trip in corporate jets for less than you pay for a middle seat in coach ñ and stick you with most of the cost
* why the effective poor are seven times more likely to be audited by the IRS than everyone else
* how the IRS became so weak that even when it was handed perfect banking records detailing massive cheating by 1,600 people, it prosecuted only 4 percent of themAmazon.com Review
Most Americans would agree that they are duty bound as beneficiaries of our democracy to pay taxes, and the majority of us do pay—-exorbitantly. But what about persons who do not pay their honest share? David Cay Johnston, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for the New York Times, here reveals how fairness and equity have eroded from the American tax system. Johnston describes in shocking detail the loopholes our government provides the “super rich”–from private individuals to profitable corporations—-to hide their wealth, to defer or evade tax payments, and to pass the bill to law-abiding middle-class Americans. The loss in revenue “imposes a severe cost on honest taxpayers” through cut-rate services, increased federal debt, and a weight on the middle class that threatens to block its ability to achieve upward social mobility.
Admitting the extreme complexity of our economy and by extension our tax code, Johnston points out that the very wealthy do, of course, pay taxes. But, because of shelters that allow them to understate most of their income, they pay small more on average than most Americans on the dollar. This is regressive, and unquestionably favors the superrich. Johnston includes examples of outrageous corporate malfeasance (such as companies that set up off-shore tax addresses) and exposes the tax benefits of the particularly loathsome practice made legendary by Jack Welch, in which thousands of wage earners are laid off while a handful of executives are granted hundreds of millions of dollars through deferred compensation, company stock options, and lucrative retirement packages, all at stock holders’ xpense. In addition to these offenses, he describes the tax evasion methods of persons who simply defy the law and are emboldened by a stressed IRS that is too underfunded to serve as an effective deterrent to tax cheats. Johnston calls for a perfect fix of the system. But because persons who most benefit from these laws comprise the “donor class” that supports the government power structure, our prospects for reform remain very bleak. –Silvana Tropea
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This book is one of the worst to hit the market. It makes the point that it is the wealthy’s job to pay for the poor. In fact this could not be farther from the truth. Shape it up Mr. Johnston. Do not buy this book at all costs, because the sales tax you pay may end up going to the “Super-Rich”. Give me a break, what a terrible book.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
I do not presume to have read this book, so in fairness, I cannot rate it. But, the comments from the reader from New Jersey regarding public accountants are puerile.
Suggesting that public accountants have a responsibility to enforce the tax code is like requiring a defense attorney to inform the judge and jury when they know their client is guilty. The rights to counsel, due process, restore of grievances, and equal justice before the law do not get suspended just because a name else doesn’t reflect a person is paying their honest share of taxes.
I judge the IRS accepts donations above and beyond an individual’s required tax liability. Perhaps the reader from NJ should consider giving more of his or her income to them, since they can really use the money.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
Mr. Johnston’s book is utter rubbish and was hard to plod through. He simply mis-states facts and spews the leftist drivel currently on spectacle by the democrats in this primary season. Fact: the top 20 percent of wage earners pay 80 percent of the taxes. I suggest a work by Milton Friedman or any reputable economist in place of this nonsense. Don’t waste your money!
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
Come on. The bottom 50% pay 4% of the federal taxes. The top 50% pay 96% of federal taxes. What conspiracy?
This is another liberal class warfare agenda piece.
Don’t judge me, look at the additional book being marketed with it on Amazon.
If you want to pay for class warfare reaffirmation — go for it. But don’t fool yourself that you are being informed. No matter how you spin it, the top 50% pay for the federal government.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
The Leader is fully aware of the (to some extent confusing and potentially complex) tax law, and the “Tax Honesty Movement”. As a replacement for of engaging the argument in a common sense way, the way tax honesty people do, DCJ chooses to muddy the waters by class warfare, the poor and disenfranchized against the rich and connected. While it may be and effective way to sell books, it isn’t shedding any new light on the issue. Sure, our government and the lobby process is corrupt. Sure, wealthy have better access. How about the fundamental questions like; – What is my “honest share”? (2%, 5%, 45% of my wages?) -Isn’t that “communism” (progressive taxation, Marxism)? – Which laws make citizens effective and living in the “several states” liable? – What, exactly is “income”? -Why is it so convoluted in the law? – What (if any) relationship is there between “income” taxes (subtitle A), and all the additional taxes (FICA, etc)? Is “income tax” a direct, or an indirect tax? How would we know, where would we find such information? – What is the relationship between Central banking, fractional set aside lending, Social security, and the income tax system? – Under what conditions was the 16th ammendment ratified (was it even ratified?)? – Even if it was properly ratified, did the 16th make new federal powers to tax? – What does Article 1 say about Federal power to tax? – Did the 16th change article 1 in any way? – Is it just a coincidence that the social security system, the income tax, and the Fed happened all at the same time? What is the economic and political effect of such mechanisms (adding to the money supply, reduccing the money supply, adding to inflation)? – Who benefits by the introduction of such systems? DCJ knows the answers to all the questions, but he chooses to lead the reader in additional directions, away from fundamental questions that citizens want to know from their government. DCJ prefers to invoke class envy than to enlighted and make the system truly “honest”. The people want to know. DCJ knows. He has a huge megaphone. He chooses to promote class warfare. As tax honesty people are adage everywhere, in courtrooms, in press conferences…”Show me the law”. What does the law say that you owe? Did the founding fathers give guys like Ted Kennedy and Hillary Clinton to tax your earnings directly? Why might they reflect that’s a terrible thought?
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5