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MY EARS ARE GOING TO BLEED! Just look at some of the key words in these prior posts: exemptions...by such and such a date...only if...property classification...long term holdings...rates. Will this ever end? Will this ever get simplified? I know we're talking local taxes in this thread, but those are on top of the Federal Taxes, what...the size of that Tax Code register is 4" thick!!! It enrages me that so many convoluted rules are in place. No one person can know all of this, and perhaps that is by design. I heard some 30 or so IRS auditors went out into the field and gave tests to key Federal tax personnel in regional offices. I believe the test failure rate was over 75%. I'll never see the day this madness comes to an end. How many productive hours are burned each year trying to comply with (or avoid)taxes...federal, state, city, school, property?? My old man busted his hump all his life and managed to squirrel away a little money for retirement. When he died part of that money was left to each of us six kids--the figure was not awesome but still good. So do you think we all took our bequeathed lump sums to buy a car, add on to the house, or buy some tuition credits. Noooo. Why? We'd see a net of 70% of that lump sum after taxes. And this was money Dad kept after he was taxed the first time. So I left my money in an IRA and will hold it to when I'm old and probably don't really need it. But I HAVE to take out (rules, you know) predetermined chunks of that money every year until I retire. Oh yes...that small chunk gets taxed, too. A flat tax of 15% on everybody (no exemptions) would generate so darn many dollars to the Treasury that even drunken legislators couldn't spend it all. Well...that might be stretch.
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