
Thinking about it, I'm for a much simplified tax system. While it would probably devastate the accountant industry, I just think it would be nice to be able to understand how much of my hard earned money is going to the federal and state governments, and why. The current reduction of the State And Local Tax (SALT) deduction proposed by the IRS is something that I didn't understand or even think about. Until I noticed Governor Andrew Cuomo going on and on about it.
Cuomo said something I certainly understand: "For the first time ever since the tax code went into effect under President Abraham Lincoln, the federal government says, we will also tax the tax you paid to the state government and the local government," Cuomo said. "So they now tax the tax that you paid. First ever tax on tax. So what does it mean? It means if you pay taxes of $100,000, you are taxed on that. If you pay property taxes of $20,000 you're now taxed on that. We have worked for seven years to reduce the tax burden on people. We have a two percent property tax cap every year, which means property taxes can't go up more than two percent. If you now tax people's property taxes, that's like a 30 percent increase."
Taxing taxes? Whoah!