Hocus Pocus

Things are not always as they seem.

When I worked as a school teacher, I never saw, touched, felt or smelled funds that were supposedly taken from me for Social Security or income taxes. The same was true for the school janitor and the superintendent of Schools. Maybe each of us had the money for an imaginary instant in the mind of some bookkeeper, but where did the money come from? Maybe where the money came from is even more important than who paid it. Obviously it came from the taxpayers in our school district.

Now when you buy a case of cola in the grocery store, where does the money you pay for it, go? Some of it goes to the clerks in the store, the driver who delivered it, to those who bottled it, to the investors of the companies involved etc. Part of what you paid also went to pay the income taxes of these people. Their taxes are embedded in the price you paid for the cola.

Can this possibly mean that all of our taxes on income are really sales taxes in disguise? The money really doesn’t come from someplace else. Rich and poor both pay these built in taxes when they buy American. Taxing only American Labor and Investment in a highly automated global economy is stupid.

Unfortunately , these taxes are not embedded on imported items and on industries that are not labor intensive. Replacing income taxes with a sales tax on everything would be good for labor and investors and could put healthcare and social security on a sounder financial footing A sales tax can be made to be progressive.