tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9734410.post2406653997021048663..comments2024-01-02T00:34:56.931-08:00Comments on Rambles: No-ing thyself - Aaron Wildavsky's notion applied to Tax Reformdrtaxsactohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12607564542286089496noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9734410.post-63021020409522617832013-07-02T13:25:29.058-07:002013-07-02T13:25:29.058-07:00The George Mason study is only one of many. Compli...The George Mason study is only one of many. Compliance costs in most studies are based on the cost of record keeping and tax preparation for the PIT (individual) and Corporate taxes. One example of the costs of compliance relates to keeping up with changes. In the first decade of the 21st century there were almost 4500 changes in the code (more than 400 per year). As the code continues to be more complex - two things happen - compliance costs go up and more and more people shave their income (estimate is loss of about $450 billion) our compliance rate (the percentage of income reported is now about 85%. <br /><br />Finally, depending on how you count spending on education (K-12 or higher ed too) the compliance cost estimated by Mercatus is a drop in the bucket in total spending for education. Remember that Pells alone are in the range of $3 billion annually. (2007 agreement stipulated $33 billion for Pells over the next 10 years).<br />drtaxsactohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12607564542286089496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9734410.post-74872680291978912192013-07-02T05:21:54.978-07:002013-07-02T05:21:54.978-07:00This comment has been removed by the author.drtaxsactohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12607564542286089496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9734410.post-10767888962317342512013-07-01T21:08:06.837-07:002013-07-01T21:08:06.837-07:00I might be in favor of the proposal, but question ...I might be in favor of the proposal, but question some of the conclusions in the George Mason study. The cost of compliance is $1 trillion? That's about the same amount as is spent on all of education, and, as acknowledged by the report's authors,40% of the amount collected in income taxes. That seems very high. Also, the study says that the IRS estimated that "individuals spent more than 3 billion hours complying with personal deductions." Does it seem reasonable to think that every adult and child spent an average of 8-ish hours on this task?Lloydhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04291580954199802764noreply@blogger.com