Man wins $138,000 trip to space.
Feds say he has to report that as income, and owe 25 grand in taxes.
Man cancels trip.
Somehow, the public good has been served.
CNN has the tragic report.
Source link: http://archive.mises.org/6196/feds-crush-mans-dream-of-going-to-space/
Feds crush man’s dream of going to space
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A while back it was some people from Extreme Makeover: Home Edition who lost their house after they couldn’t pay the tax on the makeover…now this. If it were me, “Wilson Blair” would be putting in an appearance right about now.
So when does the IRS start sticking it to the folks at NASA?
I have seen a little of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, and I think that those people aren’t going to be happy for long. I wonder how many of them can afford to pay the state for the remodel job.
BTW, the “Wilson Blair” reference was to the character in “Unintended Consequences” (an ATF agent killed and then impersonated by the hero of the book) not to the Canadian MP that Google turns up.
Save these in the column of the more visible penalties of the welfare state.
The really horrible thing about property taxes is that they keep nailing you again and again. If you’re one of the few who lives more than a century, you could easily pay more in property taxes than you initially paid for your house! I believe this is even after-inflation, as property-taxes are based on the appraised value of your house.
So, say you buy a house at age 20. You live to be over 120. By the end of your life, in high property-tax counties, you will have paid more in property taxes than you initially paid on the value of your house, possibly more than the current value. If you have very little income at this point in your life, you might not even be able to afford the property taxes. At this point, we have the government making 120+ year olds homeless by stealing their houses.
Georgists couldn’t be more wrong. The propety tax is probably the worst of all taxes. It is the tax that evicts people out of their own homes!
I agree about the property tax, but you give an example of a century for a high tax county. What counties are these? In the county I am in, there are cities with rates of 6% and 9%. 9% means $9,000 on a $100,000 house. When these hit these levels it was a several hundred percent increase, and the county made it retroactive.
Of course the city that has the 9% (or is it a little more?) rate has livable houses that can be purchased for under $30,0000. Under $20,000 if you look and know what you are looking at.
So, say you buy a house at age 20. You live to be over 120. By the end of your life, in high property-tax counties, you will have paid more in property taxes than you initially paid on the value of your house, possibly more than the current value.
Indeed; and in a relatively few years human lifespans will likely increase to thousands of years…what then?
My analysis assumed a 1% property tax rate; high rates mean that you’ll pay more taxes than your house value earlier in your life.
9% is quite horrendous.
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