New Member, need some insight

[Confused!!!]

Hi,

I have been looking over your site, and would like to hear what any of you think about how the income tax is imposed and enforced by the government. I have been reading and listening to several of your inductees into the quatlosers hall of fame over the past few years, and am now thoroughly confused! I have also read over some of this sites rebuttals to their positions, but can't seem to get by the name calling in order to understand this sites fundamental beliefs, so I am asking for some answers to some questions that I have. These questions are probably elementary for you, but will go a long way to help me make the right decisions. Feel free to respond to any or all of these points. (I am not here to prove anything to anyone but myself, so I am starting from scratch, and coming from the position that I don't know if I am liable or not) TIA

1.) Constitutionality - I believe that the Income Tax (as written) is 100% constitutional, so I don't have a problem with the 16th amendment.

2.) I know that "ignorance of the law is no excuse", so if I am 15 years old, got my 1st job, and want to find out if I am liable for the income tax, where do I begin my search.

I will start with these two questions and hopefully get some dialogue leading to other concerns I have.

[Demosthenes]

Read Sections 1, 63, and 61 of the Internal Revenue Code.

§ 1. Tax imposed

(c) Unmarried individuals
There is hereby imposed on the taxable income of every individual ... a tax determined in accordance with the following table:

§ 63. Taxable income defined

(a) In general
... the term “taxable income” means gross income minus the deductions allowed by this chapter

§ 61. Gross income defined

gross income means all income from whatever source derived, including (but not limited to) the following items:
(1) Compensation for services, including fees, commissions, fringe benefits, and similar items;
(2) Gross income derived from business;
(3) Gains derived from dealings in property;
(4) Interest;
(5) Rents;
(6) Royalties;
(7) Dividends;
(8) Alimony and separate maintenance payments;
(9) Annuities;
(10) Income from life insurance and endowment contracts;
(11) Pensions;
(12) Income from discharge of indebtedness;
(13) Distributive share of partnership gross income;
(14) Income in respect of a decedent; and
(15) Income from an interest in an estate or trust.

If you have income from your job (compensation for services) then you're liable for the income tax.

[Demosthenes]

For detailed information about the various scams peddled by the Hall of Shamers, try this site:

http://evans-legal.com/dan/tpfaq.html

[LPC]

1.) Constitutionality - I believe that the Income Tax (as written) is 100% constitutional, so I don't have a problem with the 16th amendment.

That is not a question.

2.) I know that "ignorance of the law is no excuse", so if I am 15 years old, got my 1st job, and want to find out if I am liable for the income tax, where do I begin my search.

Your search of the law?

Wait a second. Didn't you just tell us, in #1 above, that you believe that the federal income tax is constitutional "as written"? How could you have concluded that if you haven't yet read the law?

I smell a troll.

[LPC]

Read Sections 1, 63, and 61 of the Internal Revenue Code.

I would also recommend sections 6012 and 6151.

Section 6012 requires that a return be filed when gross income (not taxable income) exceeds certain amounts, and section 6151 requires that the tax shown on the return be paid when the return is filed.

You can browse the Internal Revenue Code as Title 26 of the United States Code at http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/ ... 01_26.html

[jg]

For those that have trouble finding the various sections of the Internal Revenue Code the site at http://www.fourmilab.ch/ustax/www/sections.html lets you select the section that you would like to view.

[Levendis]

1.) Constitutionality - I believe that the Income Tax (as written) is 100% constitutional, so I don't have a problem with the 16th amendment.

That's not a question, but I'll answer it anyway. The income tax, though entirely written (in a manner of speaking), is not a cohesive whole. Therefore it is quite possible for certain parts of the "written" income tax to conflict with the Constitution, especially in certain factual situations. For example, part of the "written" income tax may be Treasury regulations that attempt to tax money that is not income due to the lack of a realization event. These situations are exceedingly rare and courts will duck the constitutional issue by finding the regulation or rule invalid as applied. Unconstitutional statutes are even rarer and are more likely to fall under equal protection violations than anything else.

2.) I know that "ignorance of the law is no excuse", so if I am 15 years old, got my 1st job, and want to find out if I am liable for the income tax, where do I begin my search.

I will start with these two questions and hopefully get some dialogue leading to other concerns I have.

If you're actually fifteen, you're probably going to be more concerned with FICA than with the income tax, especially come tax time when you learn that you can't get a FICA refund. I know I was.

If you were genuinely interested, sections 1, 61, 62, 63, 161, 162, 212, 261, 263, and 6012 would be a good place to start. Then read the INDOPCO Supreme Court opinion since it recites many of the standard issues. You could, of course, pick up the Thomson West Concise Hornbook on federal income taxation. It lays everything out quite nicely.

[Levendis]

Both fermilab and cornell are out of date. The code at taxalmanac.org is generally up to date.

[grammarian44]

Wait a second. Didn't you just tell us, in #1 above, that you believe that the federal income tax is constitutional "as written"? How could you have concluded that if you haven't yet read the law?

I smell a troll.

There are a lot of other indications besides that one that "Confused" is ingenuine. But note that "Confused" has already pre-loaded a response if called out as a troll or anything else: he or she supposedly has trouble getting beyond the "name calling" on the site.

So if troll possibilities are raised, we all know how Confused will respond: "You guys just do a bunch of name calling. Gosh, this is so unfair! Why can't you just tell me straight out what the law is?"

It's better just to let Demo's recitation of the statutory scheme speak for itself and be done with it.

[Joey Smith]

http://www.hereisthelaw.com

[jg]

Jonathan Seigel, a professor of law, addresses whether there is a law mandating the filing of income taxes and he says: "Here are the laws that (a) impose an income tax on you, (b) require you to file an income tax return, and (c) require you to pay taxes" at http://docs.law.gwu.edu/facweb/jsiegel/ ... tNoLaw.htm

The cites to sections are the same as those posted above, btw.

[grixit]

Be happy. I didn't start making enough money to pay taxes on until i was 20.

[Judge Roy Bean]

The chances of this being a 15 year-old are small, unless there has been some drastic improvement in English education in the grade school he or she is allegedly from.

Be that as it may, at 15, you won't make enough money to actually pay income taxes. They wil have been withheld from your paycheck by your employer but you will undoubtedly receive a refund if you file.

But you won't escape social security, so in a sense, you will be paying taxes.

[Confused!!!]

It's late on Sunday and I have had a few, so I will digest all this in the coming week.

I don't know what a troll is, but I take it as being negative. I posted that I am confused because of all the conflicting information, as I have been listening to both sides, and both sound very convincing. That is why I am starting over from the beginning as if I was never in the system, and now want to find out the truth, whatever that may be.

I will start with what is recommended from you, and get back to you with what I read.

Again, thanks for your time.

[jkeeb]

I couldn't "have a few" until I was 18 in Kansas.

[Judge Roy Bean]

Ah - a 15 year-old who has had a few.

Or was the orginal question simply rhetorical?

[LPC]

I am confused because of all the conflicting information, as I have been listening to both sides, and both sound very convincing.

I would think that alchemy can sound "very convincing" also.

Judge Easterbrook put it very well when he wrote that:

"Some people believe with great fervor preposterous things that just happen to coincide with their self-interest."

Coleman v. Commissioner, 791 F.2d 68, 69 (7th Cir. 1986).

Jesus of Nazareth had something similar in mind when he said that:

"Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road is easy that lead to destruction, and there are many who take it. For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it."

Matt. 7:13-14 (NRSV).

It is often hard to distinguish between what we want to believe and what is actually to be believed.

[LPC]

Ah - a 15 year-old who has had a few.

And a 15-year-old who (a) has been reading tax protester arguments, (b) has found Quatloos, and (c) doesn't know what a troll is.

Truly, a strange mixture of the naive and the worldly.

[LPC]

Let me repeat this for you - the "tax protestor" side (the other side if you will) spends an inordinate amount of time in court, paying fines, penalties and interest and going through more gyrations than a twitchy stripper to protect their $10 an hour, unless they are a doctopr or dentist, in which case it is ALL gred driven.

That's pretty good writing, but I have purely literary criticism.

The reference to "twitchy stripper" would be much funnier (I think) if you change it "epileptic stripper."

(Side note: There's a fairly amusing subplot involving an epileptic prostitute in the original novel on which the movie M*A*S*H was based.)

[Truthstalker]