End Tax Cheating to Balance the Budget

[ET]

I'll leave you to preach to the choir (with a couple of known, notable exceptions), my friend. I no longer care to dedicate the time necessary to address such issues. Other things call, such as my golf game and Ron Chernow's "Alexander Hamilton".

[Sandy]

[Chris]

[William Thornton]

[Chris]

I think it's disgraceful that clergy are allowed to take such high percentage of compensation packages for "housing allowance". Your payback will come when you find that your Social Security checks (when you retire) are not as high as your non-clergy neighbor,becaue you didn't pay enuf into the system. Especially if you made over $117,000 before December of any year. And for the record..One year in the 1980s, I refused to use a deduction because I believed it was wrong. Too many Americans fill out the 1040 (or have it done by a professional), with the attitude "I'm gonna cheat the government out of everything I can!" Donald TGrump is one of these people. SHAMEFUL

[William Thornton]

On the HA, Chris:

1. Clergy pay SECA taxes on the allowance (and salary). For those living in parsonages, the minister pays SECA tax on whatever cash HA he or she gets (for utilities usually) and also pays SECA tax on the fair rental value of the house. There's no reduction in social security taxes or resultant payments when they retire. You are uninformed on this.

2. The HA for those living in church owned housing gets the same tax treatment as does any employee who lives in an employer's home at their (employer's) convenience.

3. Some clergy (like me) get a cash HA and live in their own home. This is a tax break long established by law.

"cheating" is when you don't play by the rules. The gummit sets the rules. I follow them. If your conscience didn't permit you to follow the rules, fine. You don't get to bind my conscience because of your convictions.

[Haruo]

But now Donald is going to be working for us, not for himself, he said so right on Twitter, and that means he'll show all of us how we can avoid taxes for 18 years, which should do wonders for the economy and improve government services by making them tighten their belts till they are really lean! I mean, look at government services in, say, Somalia, where hardly anybody has paid taxes the last couple decades...

[Sandy]

I've been royally burned on the clergy housing allowance, by a church treasurer who didn't know what he was doing. Fortunately, I've been able to pay off what I owed, and was allowed to pay back into FICA to restore my social security standing. Several other staff members at the same church, including two pastors, got burned as well, one had to sell his home to pay what he owed. The church did not help.

Conservatives and their ultra right wing extremist media screech and flap their lips over the fact that so many people don't make enough to pay taxes, and lament over budget deficits and debt, and yet they are perfectly fine with those who have influence, via their money, rigging the laws so that the corporate oligarcy and the wealthy can "legally" avoid paying taxes at the same rate and percentage of their income that the rest of us do. So now you've got a guy running for President who has clearly taken advantage of loopholes that no ordinary, middle class citizen could ever get, who is proposing a tax plan that "cuts" taxes, for the wealthy only, and raises them up to 20% on the middle class, and the same shriekers and lip flappers want to blindly support that. If you genuinely "avoid all the taxes that you can," then how do you vote for the guy who is going to raise yours and cut his?

I'm all for taking all of the benefits that I get when it comes to taxes. But I think I should get the same benefits as any other American does, including Donald Trump. He was apparently able to take the full dollar amount of an estimated capital loss, over an unlimited number of years, and avoid paying any tax for nearly 20 of those years. My wife and I sold a house in Missouri in 1990, at a loss, but we were capped on the total dollar amount we could deduct in any given year at $5,000, and limited to only 5 years of eligibility. So we only got to claim a third of the actual loss. That puts some context on the "fair share" argument.

[William Thornton]

Decide what you want to discuss here. If it's the housing allowance, I corrected Chris' error. If it's tax cheating, no one has offered any specific cheat or cheater. If it is tax avoidance then I think whichever one of us deliberately pays more taxes than they legally owe 'fess up and lead the discussion.

[William Thornton]

Sandy, I've written a good bit on the housing allowance (as well as advised a number of ministers and churches) and am interested in your experience. I'd like to understand what your experience was and how your church treasurers erred. You could PM me if you wish. Thanks.

[Jim]

[Haruo]

I am curious about the specifics of Donald's 900M loss. What happened there?

[Jim]

I doubt if anyone knows or will say but it seems to have been due mostly to the collapse of the gambling enterprises...beautiful people. The choices this year are worse than bad, certainly the worst in my lifetime.

[Sandy]

[KeithE]

[Tim Bonney]

I''ll have to back check Trump statements. I feel like Trump has argued against illegal immigration because of them being a tax burden. Does anyone else remember that?

If so it is still a bigger problem for him avoiding taxes for many years even if Clinton used the same law because if you are going to berate illegal immigrants for not paying taxes and haven't paid in 18 years aren't you sponging off the system far more than they are?

Of course, Trump could be transparent and release his taxes like everyone else who runs for President. Not doing so just makes it look like either something illegal or disturbing is in those forms. The not knowing seems to me to be worse for him than the truth unless the truth is just too bad for him to even consider releasing them.

[Sandy]

So those who are defending Trump, saying he just innocently took advantage of tax law shouldn't have any problem with Hillary doing so either. Well, except she disclosed her returns, and he hasn't.

[KeithE]

He may not be cheating on taxes, but