Possible Taxes For Broadband Users

Morganis101 writes "CNET News reports that some broadband users might have to endure new universal service taxes. From the article: 'The suggestions came as lawmakers started debating changes to the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which created the framework for the Universal Service Fund. The USF should continue to be industry funded, but the base of contributors should be expanded to all providers of two-way communications, regardless of technology used, to ensure competitive neutrality, a bipartisan coalition of rural legislators said in a June 28 letter to the U.S. House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee, which will be drafting the rewrites. That means companies providing broadband services such as VoIP over telephone wires would also have to pay into the fund.'"

Comments

Re:Taxation Without Reputation

[Chris Burke]

We could argue about the merits of income tax versus sales tax; I worry about the implementation of a saes tax.

But if you insist on an income tax, it must be a progressive one. And no, a flat tax is not progressive. By definition a tax is only progressive if the rate increases as your income increases. A flat tax is not progressive.

Now the reason why a progressive income tax is essential to "fairness" is the very obvious fact that 25% of the income of a person barely making ends meat is much more significant -- read financially damaging -- than 25% of the income of a person who's biggest financial worry is whether they will be able to send all of their kids to Ivy League schools if they don't get scholarships. It is not "fair" at all to expect someone who can't afford medical care for their children to support society with the same contribution as a wealthy person.

Flat tax sounds good on paper, so long as that paper has no figures representing reality and the difficulties faced by the poor. But the fact is that a flat tax necessarily means that the burden of supporting society is placed more heavily on the poor. A progressive tax attempts to alleviate this by taking more from those who can afford more. I pay a greater percentage in taxes than a lot of people, yet I consider this to be imminently fair. That's just my opinion. It isn't my opinion that flat taxes place a greater burden on lower income families though.