Elizabeth Seton Academy in Boston, an independent Catholic school serving inner-city families, would be thrilled to have a small fraction of that $500k. The total sum would take 25 girls all the way from 9th grade into college.

So yes, there are ways to spend that money for greater impact. I agree that our medical system should explore hospice care as an alternative — can be better for patients, families, and the taxpayer. Life is measured by the quality of the days, not the number of days.

On the medicare side The NYT calculated that the average boomer couple paid 100,000 into medicare and would extract on average $300,000.

My plan was not meant to be any more heartless than the way we allocate donated organs. If your resources are X than your budget is X not Y. If you want to offer the entire populous an identical medical benefit without any thought of merit or contribution (pretty much the opposite of the Social Security system) I think lots of people would vote for that plan on the grounds of fairness. That is for the most part the status quo.

In that system my wifes 82 year old grandfather (the most deserving person alive based on his 35 year working life and combat veteran of 2 wars) gets flown in a life flight helicopter from the local hospital to the intensive care unit at the regional medical center to extend his life by 8 months. The cost would be hard to even estimate but I’ll throw out $500,000. I loved that man but what was our return on investment for that care.

Would those dollars have a greater impact for good if spent on pre-k for 4 year-olds?

I do agree that lower-income households are likely to get back everything they pay in (and then some!), but couldn’t you also say the same of federal programs funded through the income tax? Does it really matter that with Social Security somebody is tallying an account with our name at the top?

Interesting proposal on Medicare. A bit heartless, perhaps, but I suspect we’re headed that direction. The present system is unaffordable.

Keep FICA. Lift the cap on social security withholdings to cover all earnings from $1 to infinity just like Medicare (THEN it would be a tax on high earners.)

Then redesign Medicare so with a per capita average spend at 1/2 the current spend rate. Have high blood pressure and high colesteral here’s your $4/month generic prescription fill-able at Walmart.

Need a hip replacement…. not so much… you’re going to need to cover that on your own or have your family or church group raise half the cost. Net result costs drop by half and the people who deserve/earned/worked for the care still get it.

You are exempting a huge amount of income — presently this income is taxed at a 15% rate through FICA, even if deductions and exemptions exclude it from federal income tax. Not sure it is possible to make up for an exclusion of this size.

Besides, in the last five years we’ve seen the corrosive effect of policies like this. A Republican candidate declaring that 47% of American households believe the government owes them a living, simply because they don’t owe income tax. Better to have a low marginal rate that kicks in early — so everybody contributes something, even if it isn’t much. Find ways other than redistributive tax policies to get wealth into their pockets, such as subsidized food/housing/medical care for those in need.

-That is a BRILLIANT idea… reward real long-term investments in productive assets while heavily taxing short-term speculation. That would be a fantastic improvement on the status quo!

The larger issue of a cap on deductions is harder… the government wants to reward people for providing for their own healthcare, retirement, housing, education, and retirement. All those things make sence to me.

They should pick the low hanging fruit first. Double the tax credit for the 1st child and don’t offer any credit for any 2nd 3rd 4th… child born after 2013. That would bend the curve slightly and reward people to think about family planning. After all if we are going to offer a path to citizenship to anyone who successfully illegally enters the country then we should encourage smaller families unless we want to wake up in 2040 with 500 million people who all expect a American (circa 2006) standard of living.

Next lower the cap on the mortgage interest deduction and exclude all 2nd homes. We need to strongly strongly encourage the ownership of a moderately valuable 1st home. That gives people access to low cost credit (because they have collateral), provides for stable neighborhoods, and gives people something to lose if they decide to become a meth dealer.

Next lets enhance the value of work and investment. Don’t tax the first 50,000 of earned income at any level. Don’t tax the first 10,000 of dividend or gain income at any level. Boost the rates on higher levels of income earned or otherwise but lets pull more people into the pool of workers and investors.

As far as share buybacks go, the money spent buying those shares would not be deductible, so companies would have to use after-tax income to buy the shares. I think this plan would stop that practice.

So what happened to just TFF? Did you forget your password while Reuters blogs were down?

I suspect you would end up raising almost no corporate income tax under that proposal, but we would see higher dividends (taxed against the recipient) and greater investment (generating taxes other ways). Wish Congress could come up with something half as innovative instead of continuing the same old broken system for a decade after everybody recognizes it is broken.

If I, as a Californian, want to spend more on education and healthcare, I don’t expect the rest of America to help pay for that.

However, I’m not paying higher taxes simply to pay more for education and healthcare. I have to pay higher taxes just to make up the difference between what my state receives from the federal government and what low tax states receive. And you want to take away the deduction I get for my subsidy. It’s already inequitable (and will never be fair), but making it more inequitable? How does that make sense?

I would further allow companies to exempt all repatriated income from taxes, if it is distributed as dividends or re-invested. So if Apple wants to take $5B of their cash sitting in off-shore accounts and bring it home to build a factory, let them do it without a penalty.

As far as dividends being taxed, they should be taxed at the point where they are converted into personal income. If a retiree lives off $30,000 in dividends, then they should be taxed at the rate for that amount of income (in my plan, it would be 25% of all income over $25K, so the tax would be $1250). IF a wealthy individual is receiving $1M in dividends, they would be taxed at the maximum rate.

A low corporate tax rate only provides incentive to hoard cash. Hoarding is a tool for mercenary management, which most publicly traded companies employ, and does not benefit shareholders or employes, and hurts the economy.