The Fair Tax Act, Part LXII

July 9, 2007  ·  Filed under: Education

Nearly There! Section 302 creates the entities responsible for taxation within the Treasury Department:

SEC. 302. ADMINISTRATION OF OTHER FEDERAL TAXES.

(a) In General- Section 7801 (relating to the authority of the Department of the Treasury) is amended by adding at the end the following:

`(d) Excise Tax Bureau- There shall be in the Department of the Treasury an Excise Tax Bureau to administer those excise taxes not administered by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

`(e) Sales Tax Bureau- There shall be in the Department of the Treasury a Sales Tax Bureau to administer the national sales tax in those States where it is required pursuant to section 404, and to discharge other Federal duties and powers relating to the national sales tax (including those required by sections 402, 403, and 405). The Office of Revenue Allocation shall be within the Sales Tax Bureau.’.

(b) Assistant General Counsels- Section 7801(b)(2) is amended to read as follows:

`(2) ASSISTANT GENERAL COUNSELS- The Secretary of the Treasury may appoint, without regard to the provisions of the civil service laws, and fix the duties of not more than 5 assistant general counsels.’.

So in exchange for disbanding the IRS we will create a Sales Tax Bureau and an Excise Tax Bureau (which by most accounts should be much smaller than the current IRS). The Secretary can appoint 5 assistant general counsels to aid in managing these Bureaus as well. The aim here seems to be to ’start fresh’ as opposed to recycling the IRS to administer the FairTax.

Starting with a new agency in my opinion has some compelling potential benefits, but some drawbacks as well. The benefits include simply not having the name ‘IRS’ which has very negative connotations that come along with it, and also starting anew means starting small, which may prevent some bloat in the new organization. The Sales Tax Bureau has the potential to be a very streamlined and modern agency.

However, being new means lacking experience and while some cross-hiring from the IRS will almost certainly occur, I believe there will be a bit of a learning curve to administering the new law.

Posted by James Kidd  ·  Trackback URL  ·  Link
 
2 Responses to “The Fair Tax Act, Part LXII”

  1. Mr. Kidd,

    I would love to see a complete analysis of section 501 and in particular 501(e).

    Duane Neighbors  ·  Jul 9, 2007 at 6:19 pm  ·  Permalink

  2. OK I discussed this in parts 28-30 on this blog in earlier posts:

    Part 28
    Part 29
    Part 30

    If you have further questions, let me know!

    James Kidd  ·  Jul 9, 2007 at 7:39 pm  ·  Permalink

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