Flat Tax

[LiamSHepard]

I am sure it has been discussed before in older threads, but I didn't see it after looking through the first 2 pages of old threads so I'm making a new one.

This is regarding a flat sales tax model that exempts food tax in the U.S.

I admit I had a hard time finding any reliable information on how much is going untaxed, so if you happen to have reliable sources (i.e. NOT Fox , MSNBC, Huffington Post, LA Times, BBC, NPR, or other know biased sources the list is very long...)
I would like to try and figure out exactly how much is not being taxed to accurately figure revenue different sales tax rates would generate in comparison to our current tax system.

Please be constructive and include links to information sources.

 

[mpw]

To try and raise your tax revenues solely through a flat sales/consumption tax would not work practically IMO.

Take somebody with an income of $1m presently taxed @ 40% and with living expenses of $400k(10% of which is food); they end the year with $200k saved, and $400k paid in Income Tax.

To raise the tax through a sales tax you'd need to set the tax rate @ 111% AND hope that by more than doubling the cost of those luxuries such as car it doesn't put them off spending.

 

[rlb999]

Most of the flat tax models I've seen base on a 23% to 27% consumption tax.