Active Military .. No Federal Taxes
- Thread starter Gary H
- Start date
Sounds good, including no federal income tax at all for anyone. Go back to the Excise, tariffs, etc. of the Constitution and see just how little gov't we actually NEED. Through the federal gov't, we the people would then have to set REAL priorities, like roads, infrastructure and military and let people actually do things for themselves.
ohen cepel
New member
Of course I would like to see it, but don't expect it will ever happen.
I would be happy with several more likely small things.
Like relieve us of the state hassles. We are having to fight to register vehicles and get driver's lic every year or so in different states or back at the last state we were in. Pain in the butt, give us a federal plate or something.
Excempt us from state taxes. Our "home state" will tax a guy for 20 years even though he never goes back there and uses nothing in the state, that is not right.
I got a ticket several years ago for not having an inspection sticker for the state of VA (then my "home state").
I went before the judge and could show that I had been on the other side of the continent and that this was the first time I had been back in the state (for Xmas).
He told me I was required to bring the vehicle back to the state for inspection annually if it was registered there so I got the keep my Xmas ticket!
I now have no ties with VA! We don't need that kind of crap.
Tax relief would be great but it is too political to happen.
I would just like to see more states be reasonable with us.
Sorry for the rant.
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He who dares wins.
NRA Life Memeber
I would be happy with several more likely small things.
Like relieve us of the state hassles. We are having to fight to register vehicles and get driver's lic every year or so in different states or back at the last state we were in. Pain in the butt, give us a federal plate or something.
Excempt us from state taxes. Our "home state" will tax a guy for 20 years even though he never goes back there and uses nothing in the state, that is not right.
I got a ticket several years ago for not having an inspection sticker for the state of VA (then my "home state").
I went before the judge and could show that I had been on the other side of the continent and that this was the first time I had been back in the state (for Xmas).
He told me I was required to bring the vehicle back to the state for inspection annually if it was registered there so I got the keep my Xmas ticket!
I now have no ties with VA! We don't need that kind of crap.
Tax relief would be great but it is too political to happen.
I would just like to see more states be reasonable with us.
Sorry for the rant.
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He who dares wins.
NRA Life Memeber
During the twenty years I was on active duty, I was frequently accused of not having to pay federal and/or state income tax. The manner in which it was said implied envy and resentment.
Many of California's weapons laws were enacted because they exempted peace officers whether they were carrying issued or personally owned weapons. It is only recently with the "assault" weapons bans that peace officers have not been exempted. There is some grumbling in that privileged class as a result, though it seems many California peace officers are unaware of what is going on in Sacramento concerning firearms laws.
Governor Gray Davis floated a trial balloon suggesting that teachers should not have to pay state income tax. That one was shot down rather quickly.
We do not need any sort of officially privileged class in the United States.
Many of California's weapons laws were enacted because they exempted peace officers whether they were carrying issued or personally owned weapons. It is only recently with the "assault" weapons bans that peace officers have not been exempted. There is some grumbling in that privileged class as a result, though it seems many California peace officers are unaware of what is going on in Sacramento concerning firearms laws.
Governor Gray Davis floated a trial balloon suggesting that teachers should not have to pay state income tax. That one was shot down rather quickly.
We do not need any sort of officially privileged class in the United States.
bruels,
As our tax system currently works, approximately 50% of Americans pay virtually no income tax and 5% of Americans pay over 50% of all income taxes. This is one reason that a large percentage of Americans have no problem with the current system, they are getting something for free.
That being said, I would happily support the notion of active duty military personel paying no federal income taxes. These men and women are already doing more than thier fair share of supporting our nation. They work long hours at low pay and are placed into some horrible situations.
I would also support the elimination of the Federal Income Tax entirely. A national sales tax would be more to my liking. However, in order to accomplish this, the sixteenth amendment to the Constitution would need to be repealed. This is very unlikely to happen.
As our tax system currently works, approximately 50% of Americans pay virtually no income tax and 5% of Americans pay over 50% of all income taxes. This is one reason that a large percentage of Americans have no problem with the current system, they are getting something for free.
That being said, I would happily support the notion of active duty military personel paying no federal income taxes. These men and women are already doing more than thier fair share of supporting our nation. They work long hours at low pay and are placed into some horrible situations.
I would also support the elimination of the Federal Income Tax entirely. A national sales tax would be more to my liking. However, in order to accomplish this, the sixteenth amendment to the Constitution would need to be repealed. This is very unlikely to happen.
Gary H,
After twenty years as a Naval officer, I suggest an entirely different approach to military pay: Pay service personnel what they are worth -- including reasonable, market-based compensation for family hardships and dangerous assignments.
Annually, I used to receive a "compensation" statement indicating that my comprehensive pay package was worth at least $25 thousand more than I was paid. This included things like tax advantages on untaxed allowances and commissary and exchange privileges. I would have gladly taken the cash and relinquished all those "Congressional tricks" that were theoretically "substitute compensation". I would make that choice because frequently (for me, 40 percent of my career) I was geographically removed from any major military installation, thus the commissary, exchange, 'O Club, recreational facilities, etc. were essentially non-existent.
In addition, when one retires at the 20+ year point, it is a lot easier to negotiate with industry for a reasonable pay and benefits package when one can assertively indicate "I am now paid $xyz", as opposed to "my pay plus other quasi-remuneration equals $xyz".
After twenty years as a Naval officer, I suggest an entirely different approach to military pay: Pay service personnel what they are worth -- including reasonable, market-based compensation for family hardships and dangerous assignments.
Annually, I used to receive a "compensation" statement indicating that my comprehensive pay package was worth at least $25 thousand more than I was paid. This included things like tax advantages on untaxed allowances and commissary and exchange privileges. I would have gladly taken the cash and relinquished all those "Congressional tricks" that were theoretically "substitute compensation". I would make that choice because frequently (for me, 40 percent of my career) I was geographically removed from any major military installation, thus the commissary, exchange, 'O Club, recreational facilities, etc. were essentially non-existent.
In addition, when one retires at the 20+ year point, it is a lot easier to negotiate with industry for a reasonable pay and benefits package when one can assertively indicate "I am now paid $xyz", as opposed to "my pay plus other quasi-remuneration equals $xyz".
Not taxing government employees at the government level they work at(such as state employees pay not state tax) would save millions of dollars each year. Do you have any idea how much infrastructure could be eliminated getting rid of the loop that give people money and then takes it right back? That is just retarded. US military personel should not have to pay any taxes period, not even sales tax. They work in a dangerous profession that treats them badly in many cases and never offers them any of the benefits most of them are told they will get. The least we could do for these people is to not tax them.
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I twist the facts until they tell the truth. -Some intellectual sadist
The Bill of Rights is a document of brilliance, a document of wisdom, and it is the ultimate law, spoken or not, for the very concept of a society that holds liberty above the desire for ever greater power. -Me
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I twist the facts until they tell the truth. -Some intellectual sadist
The Bill of Rights is a document of brilliance, a document of wisdom, and it is the ultimate law, spoken or not, for the very concept of a society that holds liberty above the desire for ever greater power. -Me
- I prefer to abolish all income taxes. Make 'em sales taxes so we can see what we're paying and what we're getting for our money. (Yes, we could exempt necessities like food, drinks, toilet paper, and Shiner... 
)
- If you keep income tax, please be sure to exempt only the federal paycheck part of income. If some General's wife is being paid for speaking engagements, that should be taxable.
Hmm. Seems to smack of favoritism, doesn't it.
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How about a different idea? Identify the problem! The problem is the lower ranks can't feed their families. More than 6,000 military families are on food stamps!
How about we do the next pay raise a bit different?
Rather than give all GIs a 4% payraise, first compute the total cost in dollars. Then, instead of giving it as a percentage, give that pay raise per capita!
Okay, so the General only gets a $200/month raise and he feels cheated. he can blow it out his barracks bag (so to speak). That $200/month raise would sure help some poor E3 or E4 feed his kids.
Simple: (total budgeted pay raise) divided by (total number of GIs).
Effective:
- Addresses problem of underpaid "bottom four" (or six) paygrades - the ones who hurt the most. It's about time! (Gee, it might even help retention of trained troops!)
Simple, effective, and efficient. Aw heck. It could never be adopted!
)- If you keep income tax, please be sure to exempt only the federal paycheck part of income. If some General's wife is being paid for speaking engagements, that should be taxable.
Hmm. Seems to smack of favoritism, doesn't it.
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How about a different idea? Identify the problem! The problem is the lower ranks can't feed their families. More than 6,000 military families are on food stamps!
How about we do the next pay raise a bit different?
Rather than give all GIs a 4% payraise, first compute the total cost in dollars. Then, instead of giving it as a percentage, give that pay raise per capita!
Okay, so the General only gets a $200/month raise and he feels cheated. he can blow it out his barracks bag (so to speak). That $200/month raise would sure help some poor E3 or E4 feed his kids.
Simple: (total budgeted pay raise) divided by (total number of GIs).
Effective:
- Addresses problem of underpaid "bottom four" (or six) paygrades - the ones who hurt the most. It's about time! (Gee, it might even help retention of trained troops!)
Simple, effective, and efficient. Aw heck. It could never be adopted!
P
PreserveFreedom
Guest
If they cut Federal taxes from Military wages, they would probably lower military wages (or hold off on increases) to compensate. I think one reason that these taxes are charged is because a lot of people who chose not to enlist would complain that it "isn't fair". This is one reason that they put license plates on government owned vehicles (other than military vehicles intended for war). It would be easier, more cost effective, and more secure to just brand the vehicle with a serial number. When my father was a police officer, he worked in a community that required a Village Vehicle Tax Sticker on every vehicle. They gave them to all the village vehicles for free, of course. Before they did, when someone was being written a ticket for not paying this tax, they would say it wasn't fair because the police car that wrote them the ticket didn't have the sticker either. The moral of the story? It is all psychological.
Who cares if it's psycological, that can be overcome if the government makes it clear why exactly it is so stupid to tax government workers....
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I twist the facts until they tell the truth. -Some intellectual sadist
The Bill of Rights is a document of brilliance, a document of wisdom, and it is the ultimate law, spoken or not, for the very concept of a society that holds liberty above the desire for ever greater power. -Me
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I twist the facts until they tell the truth. -Some intellectual sadist
The Bill of Rights is a document of brilliance, a document of wisdom, and it is the ultimate law, spoken or not, for the very concept of a society that holds liberty above the desire for ever greater power. -Me
The only time military personal should not pay taxes is when they are in combat.
There are a lot of career military people who
depending on their MOS, would never see combat. Sure it's possible, but not neccessarily going to happen except under the most extreme of situations.
And for having a dangerous job, the average construction worker is more likely get killed doing his/her job verses a career soldier on active duty.
Taxes should be equally assesed, period.
I have always felt that people working for the bureacracy, military or civilian are paid to much anyways.
So give me break!
Waterdog
There are a lot of career military people who
depending on their MOS, would never see combat. Sure it's possible, but not neccessarily going to happen except under the most extreme of situations.
And for having a dangerous job, the average construction worker is more likely get killed doing his/her job verses a career soldier on active duty.
Taxes should be equally assesed, period.
I have always felt that people working for the bureacracy, military or civilian are paid to much anyways.
So give me break!
Waterdog
Having served four years on a SAC base I disagree with Dangus and agree with Dennis. As long as we have the infernal income tax, then everyone must pay their share. When we start making exceptions for military, then we should for police officers, Coast Guard personnel, forest rangers, fish & game officers, emergency medical personnel (are county employees exempt whereas private services are not?), firefighters, snowplow drivers (often out in the worst weather on the worst roads), prison personnel (cooks as well as guards?), etc. etc.
Within the military does that exception include everyone from the backline cooks to the frontline infantry, does it include naval paper pushers in the Pentagon as well as destroyer personnel on screen duty for carriers, does it include fighter interceptor pilots as well as mechanics?
No, everyone should adhere to the same rules. If the military people don't like the deal, they can get out.
Personally, I'd rather everyone serves two years for combat training and then active duty on land, sea or air followed by several decades of active reserve. By "everyone" I mean male, female, old, young, handicapped or crippled. Useful jobs can be found for anyone unless they are a mental vegetable. Like Switzerland, everyone in every community should be armed and ready to defend their patch of homeland or be able to go where needed. With a nation which IS an army, navy, air force and marine corps then we would not need a large standing contingent of each - but only a core around which to bring the reserves together as necessary.
The 2nd amendment would then apply to its fullest. The "militia" is every one of us from 80 year-old grandmas manning communications systems to 6 year-old sappers and snipers.
Within the military does that exception include everyone from the backline cooks to the frontline infantry, does it include naval paper pushers in the Pentagon as well as destroyer personnel on screen duty for carriers, does it include fighter interceptor pilots as well as mechanics?
No, everyone should adhere to the same rules. If the military people don't like the deal, they can get out.
Personally, I'd rather everyone serves two years for combat training and then active duty on land, sea or air followed by several decades of active reserve. By "everyone" I mean male, female, old, young, handicapped or crippled. Useful jobs can be found for anyone unless they are a mental vegetable. Like Switzerland, everyone in every community should be armed and ready to defend their patch of homeland or be able to go where needed. With a nation which IS an army, navy, air force and marine corps then we would not need a large standing contingent of each - but only a core around which to bring the reserves together as necessary.
The 2nd amendment would then apply to its fullest. The "militia" is every one of us from 80 year-old grandmas manning communications systems to 6 year-old sappers and snipers.
But don't you see the millions of dollars wasted taking money right back that you just gave to someone? It makes no sense at all. Federal workers should have to pay state taxes where they live and state workers should have to pay federal taxes, but either paying money right back where the paycheck came from is absolutely retarded. It makes no sense. What is the purpose? How can we justify millions of dollars wasted in processing?
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I twist the facts until they tell the truth. -Some intellectual sadist
The Bill of Rights is a document of brilliance, a document of wisdom, and it is the ultimate law, spoken or not, for the very concept of a society that holds liberty above the desire for ever greater power. -Me
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I twist the facts until they tell the truth. -Some intellectual sadist
The Bill of Rights is a document of brilliance, a document of wisdom, and it is the ultimate law, spoken or not, for the very concept of a society that holds liberty above the desire for ever greater power. -Me
Waterdog,
I'll give you a break from you're fantasyland, and that's about it. I can see you've never served in our military and had to deal with some of those conditions. I was stationed in Hawaii, OK sounds good right, WRONG. Me and my pregnant wife were put in a house that was the size of my garage now, had lead paint chipping off the walls, and had been built back before WWII. On top of those fine conditions, I lived paycheck to paycheck as a lower enlisted. The previous duty station was in the Mojave desert where it was 140 in the summer in the shade. I would never have lived there if it hadn't been for the military. Yet our house was a duplex that had been built when the base first was built. Some people got lucky and lived in new housing but we didn't so oh well. Not complaining but in appreciation for living in such a place as those two, I was paid enough that I qualified for WIC and food stamps.
I never understood why I helped pay my own paycheck. No I didn't want that money so I could put it in savings and collect the interest. I wanted the US to put it towards their own interest earning accounts. That helped me much more. Let's not mentiont he inevitable deployment to some place for weeks or months. Those stationed away from their familys in Korea for a year, just waiting on the divorce papers. You're right we were paid way too much. I got out last year and since I didn't have time to get that college degree due to deployments out of nowhere and the occassional field time that came up, I had to fall back on a gov't job. I now work for the state of Oklahoma. I have to work 2 jobs and my wife also works just to take care of the bills and the keep the kid in a daycare. That's because the state pays me 14,500 per year to do accounting for it's state parks. You are right again, I make WAY too much!
[This message has been edited by HukeOKC (edited July 31, 2000).]
I'll give you a break from you're fantasyland, and that's about it. I can see you've never served in our military and had to deal with some of those conditions. I was stationed in Hawaii, OK sounds good right, WRONG. Me and my pregnant wife were put in a house that was the size of my garage now, had lead paint chipping off the walls, and had been built back before WWII. On top of those fine conditions, I lived paycheck to paycheck as a lower enlisted. The previous duty station was in the Mojave desert where it was 140 in the summer in the shade. I would never have lived there if it hadn't been for the military. Yet our house was a duplex that had been built when the base first was built. Some people got lucky and lived in new housing but we didn't so oh well. Not complaining but in appreciation for living in such a place as those two, I was paid enough that I qualified for WIC and food stamps.
I never understood why I helped pay my own paycheck. No I didn't want that money so I could put it in savings and collect the interest. I wanted the US to put it towards their own interest earning accounts. That helped me much more. Let's not mentiont he inevitable deployment to some place for weeks or months. Those stationed away from their familys in Korea for a year, just waiting on the divorce papers. You're right we were paid way too much. I got out last year and since I didn't have time to get that college degree due to deployments out of nowhere and the occassional field time that came up, I had to fall back on a gov't job. I now work for the state of Oklahoma. I have to work 2 jobs and my wife also works just to take care of the bills and the keep the kid in a daycare. That's because the state pays me 14,500 per year to do accounting for it's state parks. You are right again, I make WAY too much!
[This message has been edited by HukeOKC (edited July 31, 2000).]
I retired after serving 20 years in the Army. We always blamed President Eisenhower for initiating the income tax on the military back in the 1950s. We also blamed President Carter for all of the "double dipper" exploits against former military working for the government. I still work for the government and view taxes as no more than just paying my own wages. I think the military should be exempt, especially during times of war (declared or otherwise) or overseas hardship tours.